Byline: Sister Anna Marie McGuan

6 min read

Human Dignity

A Look at Complementarity through the Eyes of ‘Me Too’

Sister Anna Marie McGuan

January 20, 2020 6:55 am January 20, 2020

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6 min read

Amid all the discussions related to the “Me Too” movement, there has been much attention given to the mistreatment and even abuse of women by men. Sometimes this panned decades,…

Amid all the discussions related to the “Me Too” movement, there has been much attention given to the mistreatment and even abuse of women by men. Sometimes this panned decades, including multiple victims. The growing awareness of these situations has raised questions about the social and cultural roles of men and women. And it’s also worth reflecting on how the differences between men and women are complementary, which means they are mutually beneficial and enriching. There are many questions for us to consider.

First, are men and women actually different? To answer, simply consult your own experience and use your common sense. Take note of obvious differences in size and shape. Look at how men interact with men and how women interact with women. Notice how a man is a father and how he treats the children differently than his wife, who is their mother. Next, look at yourself. Young girls have different struggles than adolescent boys; women face growing pains that men do not, and vice versa. They are also interested in different things. Those sorts of differences are not bad, but really are very good, though not always easy to experience.

Going further, is it wrong to be different, to be “unequal”? No, because being different is not related to one’s dignity. Unequal dignity, as a philosophical position, is false and should be opposed. The “Me Too” movement (in part) is a response from women who have experienced an insult to their dignity precisely in the realm of their difference from men. In the material grounding of what makes her her, she was injured and degraded. Yet, she has nothing of which to be ashamed. Abuse and derogatory behavior toward the opposite sex are inexcusable and unacceptable. Acknowledging differences and attractions between men and women does not degrade either sex, nor do differences necessarily lead to the objectification and use of the other. What, then, is the alternative?

In a word, it is complementarity. Complementarity is a way of relating between man and woman, male and female, that respects and reverences the differences in the other without making “different” mean “less than” or “better than” the opposite sex. Pope St. John Paul II wrote: “Womanhood expresses the ‘human’ as much as manhood does, but in a different and complementary way. When the Book of Genesis speaks of ‘help’ (2:18-25), it is not referring merely to acting, but also to being. Womanhood and manhood are complementary not only from the physical and psychological points of view, but also from the ontological. It is only through the duality of the ‘masculine’ and the ‘feminine’ that the ‘human’ finds full realization” (Letter to Women, No. 7, emphases in original).

In other words, without both men and women, what humanity really is cannot be expressed or even fully known by us. This does not mean that every person has to be married or raise a family in order to realize his or her full potential. It does mean, however, that if we really want to know and understand men, we have to understand women, too. If we want to grow as individuals in strength of character, spirit and body, we have to do that in a community that teaches respect and understanding for the differences inherent in masculinity and femininity. These differences bring out the best of both worlds — the best of what is masculine or feminine in each of us.

None of this means we should do away with strong women or kind men. In fact, just the opposite is the goal. Let women become strong in an appropriately feminine way. Let men be compassionate in ways that incorporate all their masculinity. A young father recently confessed to me, “I’m a better father when my wife is around. I look at her and I want to be better for her sake, and for the kids. Her presence makes me do it right.” This is complementarity in action: she cannot be the father, only he can. But her presence makes him a better one. The same would be true for her mothering — it’s better with him there.

As Mary Prudence Allen, RSM, PhD wrote in her article, “The Fruitful Complementarity of Men and Women,” complementarity has four essential characteristics: equal dignity, significant difference, synergetic relation, and intergenerational fruition. Here, I only speak about the first two, but the last two can be summed up like this: something more happens when you have a man and woman together, and that something can be fruitful for generations (the obvious, but not only, example is children, grandchildren, etc.).

The equal dignity of man and woman is rooted in their creation in the image and likeness of God (cf. Gn 1:26-31). It can also simply be observed and known through philosophical inquiry. However, this knowledge is obscured by sins, especially sexual sins, which tend to make the other into an object for me, rather than a person who has rights and dignity that go beyond my pleasure. This goes both ways — women objectify men and men objectify women. Neither is good nor healthy. Making positive choices toward virtue, especially to interrupt the type of thinking or acting that objectifies the other person, is critical to understanding this foundation of complementarity.

The significant difference between men and women is known from experience and observation. Go back to your own reflection on what you see between men and women. They are different — this is not bad. Difference can be non-competitive; we can learn from each other rather than try to beat one another. In this same vein, we can learn to appreciate and even love what is “other” in men and women.

The biblical roots of “image and likeness” shape the Christian understanding of the human person. A Christian anthropology takes the polemics out of the differences between sexes: different is good, not a threat. The differences between male and female, man and woman, find their purpose in the relationship of complementarity. Therefore, not only is being different from each other not a threat, it actually brings out the best of both men and women.

Sister Anna Marie McGuan is with the Religious Sisters of Mercy in Alma, Michigan.

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7 min read

Evil

Can the Existence of Evil Disprove God’s existence?

Sister Anna Marie McGuan

January 20, 2020 6:08 am January 20, 2020

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7 min read

The existence of evil is a common objection to the existence of God, or at least to a personal God who is all-knowing and all-good. How is it possible to…

The existence of evil is a common objection to the existence of God, or at least to a personal God who is all-knowing and all-good. How is it possible to reconcile belief in God with the clear evidence of evil and its manifold manifestations? This is a good question, and one that people have been asking for thousands of years (just read through the book of Job in the Old Testament). To answer the question, two related, yet distinct ideas must be examined.

The meaning of evil

Firstly, it is necessary to establish what exactly is meant by “evil.” When speaking of evil, it is easy to see it as a force that drives nature or people toward destruction. However, evil does not exist per se, meaning in and of itself. It only exists in things as a lack of something that should be present. St. Thomas Aquinas wrote: “…every being, as such, is good; …evil can exist only in good as in its subject” (STh., Q. 49, a. 3). For example, blindness is not something added to the eye; it is the lack of a power that should be there. The eye suffers the deprivation of the good of sight, which is an evil. Sickness is not the addition of a new perfection; it is the lack of health in a body. Hence, a physician works precisely to restore someone to health, the good state the body should be in.

This understanding of evil is important because it immediately rules out the idea that the material world is evil and must be overcome in order for human persons to be happy. That dualistic perception of the world and its origins is at the heart of the Manichean heresy, which lies within the Gnostic tradition. Essentially, the two eternal principles of “good” and “evil” are at war, and all matter is seen as evil. This, of course, is in direct opposition to the biblical tradition which precedes it, in which all creation is declared “good,” even “very good,” in Genesis 1. Matter is definitely not evil in the biblical vision.

What about when bad things happen? Physical or natural evil that people experience is the playing out of the laws of the universe, like the earthquake that causes the tsunami that causes the destruction of an island and all the plants and creatures living on it. One the one hand, it is seen as a tragedy. On the other hand, however, how it happened is perfectly logical and can be traced back through the laws of nature. This type of evil can also be quite relative. For example, the lion eats the antelope. Good for the lion, evil for the antelope. As St. Thomas Aquinas wrote, “Now, the order of the universe requires…that there should be some things that can, and do sometimes, fail” (STh., Q. 49, a. 2).

The existence of evil

Secondly, once evil is understood as the privation of a good and not a principle of existence, the idea free will in rational creatures must be addressed. Moral evil is more nuanced than physical evil, and it is really at the heart of the above-stated question about God. Moral evil refers to the choice by a rational creature to do what he knows is not good, either for himself or for others. In this case, the privation of the good that ought to be there is caused by the choice of the creature. For example, the thief lacks the virtue of justice. The good that ought to be present, namely, the ready disposition to give to each what is due, is lacking. Instead, the thief has an inordinate desire to possessions and violates justice in order to satisfy that desire. A famous line from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn summarizes this perfectly: “Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes … right through every human heart — and through all human hearts.” Man, each and every man, chooses to commit moral evil or not. God is not the cause of this type of evil, but he does allow it to exist.

If God is all good — why doesn’t He stop people from doing bad things? This is the conundrum, right? The answer lies in the great value and the goodness of freedom, even when it has gone wrong. Make no mistake — God has explained what freedom is for: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might” (Dt 6:5). Or, as St. Paul wrote: “The commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery, You shall not kill, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,’ and any other commandment, are summed up in this sentence, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” (Rm 3:9-10).

Each person has an innate understanding that what St. Paul says is true, and freedom’s true purpose is clear. Yet, if someone makes a bad or a vicious choice, God still permits the choice. The power of goodness and love, latent within the human will, is so great and good, that God will not thwart man’s use of it. He wants humans to choose to love freely — to love him freely, to love the self freely, and to love others freely. He could have created puppets who automatically loved him and could not do otherwise. He did not. As such, there are adverse consequences to human freedom: sin and the effects of sin.

Sin and evil

That is really the crux of the problem. It can be explained metaphysically and in a satisfactory way that evil exists, but God’s seeming absence from the scene right when we need him fails to satisfy. But, is he absent? St. Augustine said: “For the Almighty God, who, as even the heathen acknowledge, has supreme power over all things, being Himself supremely good, would never permit the existence of anything evil among His works, if He were not so omnipotent and good that He can bring good even out of evil.”

St. Augustine’s argument here is actually the only solution. The existence of evil cannot disprove the existence of God, because evil exists only in something good as in a subject (blindness in the eye, illness in the body) or as part of the lawful order of the universe. Yet, God’s allowance of evil, especially evil freely chosen on the part of human persons, cannot but bring us to the question of why? To begin to understand this, the nature of human freedom must be appreciated and understood. Freedom is a power for good, not for evil, but it can be misused. God allows this because this is how he created rational human beings — for the good, capable of evil. He will not go back on his creation. At the same time, the evil that God permits, will, in his time and purposes, be an avenue from which he brings good.

Sister Anna Marie McGuan is with the Religious Sisters of Mercy in Alma, Michigan.

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6 min read

Culture

Called to Community

Sister Anna Marie McGuan

January 14, 2020 3:52 pm January 14, 2020

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6 min read

Men and women are by nature social animals. We usually grow up in a familial setting and attend school with other boys and girls. We learn, through these relationships, what…

Men and women are by nature social animals. We usually grow up in a familial setting and attend school with other boys and girls. We learn, through these relationships, what appropriate social behavior is and what is not. We also learn that friendship can be a rich source of personal and communal growth. Society also tends to organize itself into groups of people, such as an extended family, a church, a business, a service organization, etc.

We now have the capacity to be in contact with friends and family (and strangers) all over the world at the touch of a screen. What is it that people are looking for in social interaction? How does one’s social nature help to deal with loneliness that everyone sometimes feels? How do people foster goodness as social beings? The first thing that people seek through social interaction is identity. Who am I? Who are you? How do we fit together?

Made for Community

First, we are born into relationships. The family is considered the fundamental cell of human society. In the family comes our first identity: as treasured son or daughter. In the family, our intrinsic value can be affirmed and, at the same time, the members can be encouraged to live up to their value. No one comes from a perfect family, but everyone comes from a family that can be better. The family becomes better when its individual members become better, more virtuous people. They do that by forming one another through truthful dialogue and corresponding action.

Second, people look for the ability to decide — and live with the decision of — “Who am I?” This is different from the identity of belonging to a certain family, or being a certain child within that family. This second answer to “Who am I?” builds on the first, stepping into the realm of freedom and holding counsel with oneself. Here human persons use their free will, in control of their own actions, to form themselves further. A person is known and revealed by his acts. It is through free-will action that people establish themselves as individuals in the world. Granted, they are already individuals, but they make up their minds themselves about who this individual is and what this individual is about. This requires making choices in society, both within the family and without. At this point, however, a person seeks personal integrity through free choice and communion with others.

Third, part of being social opens people up to areas of potential growth. Through interactions with others, for example, a young person may begin to experience in which he or she can make a positive difference in the life of another. On the other hand, he may also see how negative consequences of his choices adversely affect others (individually and as a group). Both are useful for a deeper self-knowledge and a greater humility. People can always improve, meaning that they can always make more and better choices that correspond to their own dignity and, at the same time, uphold the dignity of others.

Better for Ourselves and Others

The desire to be better, to be more real — to be one’s best self even — dwells within the human heart. To deny this is to shut down or handicap our rational nature. Human freedom is not meant to atrophy, it is meant to become strong and robust. Inertia of the will leads to personal atrophy — becoming a weaker or worse version of who you could be. Good choices, communion and strong relationships stop that from happening. In fact, the reverse happens. Freedom allows one to become freer, able to choose better for the sake of one’s own good and the good of others.

When members of a community are not focused on fostering the individual’s potential for good, however, people drift toward inertia or, worse, poorer choices. They can suffer from loneliness and even despair due to a lack of meaning and purpose in their lives. This does not mean that every conversation people have must be about purpose and meaning. It does mean that encouragement, help and kindness could be extremely formative for people in a healthy and positive way. It also means that negativity and discouragement (not the same as truthful criticism) should be avoided. When facing loneliness, the best thing to do is to go outside of oneself, to counteract the loneliness in some way. This is most effective when that going out of oneself contributes in some way, however small, to the well-being of another.

Living for Others

Going back to the choices the individual makes about personal integrity, the choices that each one makes about identity, meaning and purpose — while having a huge impact on the individual — have an enormous impact on others. Integral, virtuous people become the “salt of the earth” and the “city set on a hill.” We can become like lights in the darkness for those who are lost. For those suffering from loneliness and a lack of communion, the help of a few good people can make a life-changing difference.

How does someone make choices toward personal transformation and friendship? Remember always to seek what is good, the true good, for oneself and for others. To desire good to someone for his or her own sake, not one’s own, is the definition of love. This means that the other is never a means to an end. One does not use another for the sake of obtaining some other good — not in small ways, not in big ways. Instead, love and friendship are focused on the virtuous development of both people. This may mean that fewer people are real friends, but so be it. We should not waste time being a user or being used.

Perhaps a little remedial work is needed before a person is capable of being able to will another’s good — because to do so requires a certain understanding of one’s self as good — and then extending that benevolence to others. Perhaps a person is not good — where should she start? Identify one area to improve, and start there. Break it down into smaller and smaller pieces if necessary. Let yourself be different, which means, if you do improve, embrace it and love yourself for doing so! All of this is the grace of God transforming and shaping the human heart. Let us be grateful for his calling forth the best part of ourselves, for our own fulfillment and the communion he creates among us.

Sister Anna Marie McGuan, R.S.M., is Director of Christian Formation in the Diocese of Knoxville.

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4 min read

Scripture

Bible 101: A Brief Introduction to Wisdom Literature

Sister Anna Marie McGuan

January 14, 2020 1:12 pm January 14, 2020

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4 min read

The Wisdom literature of the Old Testament is an eclectic collection of proverbs, moral lessons, riddles, warnings, extended meditations, and philosophical inquiry and debate. It also includes hymns and even love poetry in the Song of Songs. The human authors of the Bible took an interest in more than just religious subjects, as anyone who reads the Bible can attest. The Wisdom literature is a prime example of that broad outlook.

The reason for this length and breadth of interest is that wisdom comes to us in many forms. There is, of course, the wisdom that we learn from God himself through revelation. There is also wisdom to be gained from human experience and reflection. For example, the question “What is it to be just?” or “What does the just man do?” can be answered from a religious perspective or from a more secular bent. The answers may be different, but they are not contradictory.

The Wisdom literature exposes us to both types of reflection, especially in the books of Proverbs and Sirach. Some of the proverbs or sayings could be considered truisms, but they do contain ageless, sage advice, along with a lot of common sense. For example, “Where words are many, sin is not wanting; but those who restrain their lips do well.” (Prv 10:19), or: “Unjust anger can never be justified; anger pulls a person to utter ruin.” (Sir 1:22).

Book of Job

Besides given sound advice, the biblical authors were not afraid to ask hard questions. In fact, they challenged inadequate understandings of wisdom and insufficient answers to questions about the meaning of suffering, diminishment and death. This, for example, is clearly the case in the book of Job. The question behind the book of Job is the enigma of the just man who suffers.

The answers given by Job’s friends, namely, that he is being punished for his sins or that there is some hidden thing he has done to displease God, are proved inadequate again and again as Job verbally spars with his interlocutors. The poetry of this book is powerful; according to some authors, it is by far the most skillful and elevated poetry in the Bible.

The final chapters are quite surprising because God answers Job, in a certain sense, but does not allow Job’s human intelligence to have dominance over the mystery of suffering. The poetry of God’s speech is breathtaking; his descriptions of the crocodile (Leviathan) and the hippopotamus (Behemoth) are fascinating. His descent into the conversation takes the form of a whirlwind, and that is what the poetry feels like.

Ecclesiastes

The book of Qoheleth, or Ecclesiastes, also does not shy away from critiquing canned answers to difficult questions. In this book, the “preacher” informs the readers that he has examined the world and “All things are vanity!” He proclaims in the first chapter: “What has been, that will be; what has been done, that will be done. Nothing is new under the sun!” (Eccl 1:9).

This sounds rather nihilistic. At times the author seems quite despondent, yet he also writes things like this: “Just as you do not know how the life breath enters the human frame in the mother’s womb, So you do not know the work of God, who is working in everything. In the morning sow your seed, and at evening do not let your hand be idle: For you do not know which of the two will be successful, or whether both alike will turn out well” (Eccl 11:5-6). There is a certain humility requisite for the wise man. It is not in our power to know all things, but we do have to decide what to do with the time we have.

Prayer book of ancient Israel

The book of Psalms is sometimes called the prayer book of ancient Israel. It is also the prayer book of Jews and Christians today. The psalms are written in poetry, and, like other books, the poems often have a parallel structure. This means that the verses are written in two or three lines, and the second and third lines are in relation to the first by interacting with its meaning. This can be through synonym, antithesis, the completion of an idea, etc. The lines within the poem can play together in lots of different ways. It can be fun to try and find the parallel meanings as one reads the psalm.

The book of Wisdom, though not included in the Hebrew Bible, also belongs to the Wisdom literature and is an extended meditation on wisdom, law and the just man. At the center of the book is a prayer for wisdom, which expresses the deep longing of each human heart for God, a longing that never goes away.

Sister Anna Marie McGuan, RSM, is director of Christian formation in the Diocese of Knoxville. Read more from the Bible 101 series here.

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5 min read

Culture

Truth and Truthfulness

Sister Anna Marie McGuan

January 7, 2020 11:17 am January 7, 2020

5 min read

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5 min read

“For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said…

“For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” Pilate said to him, “What is truth?” (Jn. 18:37-38)

This snippet of dialogue comes from part of a conversation between Pontius Pilate and Jesus on Good Friday. After asking Jesus “What is truth?” Pilate walked away from him. He didn’t wait to hear the answer. Was he not interested in an answer? Or, cynically, did he believe there wasn’t one? Perhaps Pilate didn’t think that truth exists at all.

What he didn’t say is “There is not truth.” That would, of course, be false. And yet many people make that claim today. That very statement is self-contradictory and self-refuting. The reason? If it is correct, then it would be true. But, then, nothing can be true, and therefore, “There is no truth” cannot be true. The reasonable and logical outcome, then, is that “There is truth” must be correct.

Context

Since truth exists, then, what is it? There are multiple ways of explaining it, all of which are related to one another. Additionally, what one means by “truth” has to be properly understood. Since the meaning of truth can be a bit complicated, it is worth looking at how we should understand it in a normal, everyday context, and then how a person’s relationship to truth plays out in his life and actions.

Perhaps the best way to start is to focus on the truth as it is normally understood in conversation and interaction: that is, the truth about the things around us. When an object is perceived, if it is perceived correctly, then it is said to be known “truly.” For example, if a woman sees a dog but calls it a banana, another person will correct her and say,“No, that is a dog, not a banana.” Her initial assignment of the category “banana” to that particular canine was erroneous and, therefore, she did not identify the truth about what it was.

Notice that this fundamental way of perceiving and naming nature presupposes that nature is something that can be known and understood. It also presupposes the normal, innate human capacity to perceive and rightly judge what things are in the world. Both of these are reasonable starting positions. This means that, unless a person is somehow impaired, that person can know the truth about things. As a starting definition, then, one could say with Thomas Aquinas that truth is “the equation of the thought and the thing.” In that statement, the word “equation” means that the perception of the object matches up to what the object is in itself.

Drawing conclusions

From this very basic ability to perceive reality for what it is, all sorts of other truths come to light. People begin to reason about reality. That means that they are able to draw conclusions about more and more of what can be known. This is where areas of learning, like philosophy, art, science, literature, math, grammar, etc. begin to develop. Over the centuries and millennia of human existence, this body of knowledge has grown as the human race has grown. Truth, then, has to do with the intelligibility of the world and human capacity to know it. The adjective “true” describes the accurate perception of reality and also the logical reasoning based upon that perception.

Yet, there is even more to truth than this objective and rather dry description. Truth is also something that people desire and expect from one another. How does one person give truth to another? The Catechism of the Catholic Church reads: “Truth as uprightness in human action and speech is called truthfulness, sincerity, or candor. Truth or truthfulness is the virtue which consists in showing oneself true in deeds and truthful in words, and in guarding against duplicity, dissimulation, and hypocrisy” (No. 2468).

Another way of saying this is that the truth living in a person is the virtue of truthfulness. Truth becomes a part of one’s identity and of one’s way of interacting with other people in the world. Without the virtue of truthfulness, individuals fracture interiorly (that is the meaning of the “duplicity, dissimulation, and hypocrisy” in the quote above) and society consequently degenerates. Thomas Aquinas said it this way: “Men could not live with one another if there were not mutual confidence that they were being truthful to one another.” Living in falsehood and then perpetuating those lies does have serious consequences — at the very least, there will be a lack of personal integrity and a negative impact upon community and society as a whole.

Witness

There is an alternative to that rather dismal picture. No one person alone can make a society truthful. Each person can only decide how he or she will bear witness to truth personally. The mechanism that was mentioned above, namely, accurate perception and then proper naming of that perception, can be applied to human speech, action and interaction.

Through choices to speak and act in truth, a person becomes truthful and virtuous. That, in turn, has an effect on society. The transformation of the community, however, only happens through the transformation of its members. The building up one one’s personal integrity through truthfulness happens one choice at a time. The solidifying and reintegration of society occurs through the same process happening in multiple persons over generations. The ability to identify and speak truth, and be truthful, is a chief characteristic of a society wanting unity and peace.

Sister Anna Mare McGuan is a Religious Sister of Mercy of Alma, Michigan. She serves the Diocese of Knoxville, Tennessee, as the director of the Office of Christian Formation.

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5 min read

Scripture

Bible 101: A Brief Introduction to Historical Books and Prophets

Sister Anna Marie McGuan

January 7, 2020 10:07 am January 7, 2020

5 min read

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5 min read

The Pentateuch or Torah ends with the death of Moses and a bold statement about Israel’s religious future: “I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that…

The Pentateuch or Torah ends with the death of Moses and a bold statement about Israel’s religious future: “I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life, that you and your descendants may live…” (Dt 30:19). With these words, the figure of Moses recedes, and the story of God and Israel moves into the conquest of Canaan, the rise of the monarchy, and the eventual destruction of both the Northern Kingdom of Israel, and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. These stories are contained in the historical books and the prophetic literature of the Old Testament.

The section of the historical books tells these stories in a chronological sequence. Since the books have multiple authors, the styles and sometimes the intentions of the authors differ. For example, the books of Joshua and Judges contain a strong theological interpretation of history. The events that happen are interpreted either as a blessing from God for Israel’s fidelity, or a curse and punishment for their infidelity. The books of 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings focus on the characters of Samuel, Saul, David, and King Solomon and the kings that follow them. Moral judgment about the characters of Samuel, Saul, David and Solomon is withheld, for the most part. The author lets the characters develop as living men, and the reader is left to meditate on each person’s decisions and actions. Later on, however, the author’s theological and moral opinion usually is expressed in a phrase like this: “And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord more than all that were before him” (1 Kgs 16:30).

These books do relay true historical events, albeit with a theological interpretation of that same history. The authors examine the history of Israel and Judah with an eye to their adherence to the covenant and their worship of the one true God. Their covenant relationship with God ought to influence their day-to-day lives, from the greatest king to the lowliest peasant. It also influences how their history as a nation unfolds. This understanding of history tied to covenant fidelity explains why the Jewish division of the Old Testament places both the historical books and the prophetic literature under “prophets.” Both are looking at the events of history and trying to understand it in relation to God. They do this in different ways.

Unlike the historical books, the prophets do not record the events of the kingdoms in any particular order. Instead, they offer words of warning, admonition, consolation and oracles about the historical experience. One way of reading the prophets is to view them as a commentary on the historical books. The commentary is written from the perspective of God, since the prophet is God’s spokesman. It is not always clear when one is reading how the prophets fit chronologically in the history of Israel and Judah, but there are many resources available where that information can be found. There also are clues in the texts themselves. For example, at the beginning of many of the prophets’ books, there is an introduction like this:

“The words of Jeremiah … to whom the word of the Lord came in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign. It came also in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, and until the end of the eleventh year of Zedekiah, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, until the captivity of Jerusalem in the fifth month” (Jer 1:1-3).

These verses are for the reader to know what the historical circumstances were for this particular prophet. Knowing that helps us understand what the oracles and warnings might be about. Since the prophetic books are written mostly in poetry and the different sections may not fit together in a connected schema, it can be easy to lose the meaning of their messages. The little historical notes help contextualize the words.

More than anything else, the prophets focus on Israel’s fidelity to God and to the covenant. They had promised to worship the one true God, and the prophets remind them over and over that there will be consequences if they do not keep their word. The prophets predict the destruction of cities and kingdoms, as well as the eventual exile of the people from their land. Other common themes include the care of the poor, widows and orphans. The exploitation of peoples is abhorrent in the sight of God.

The prophets also contain passages full of hope, where they look forward to the return of the exiles to the land and the renewal of the covenant. They also point to a future king, a Messiah, who will bring peace.

Sister Anna Marie McGuan, RSM is Director of Christian Formation in the Diocese of Knoxville.

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