The Twelve Minor Prophets (, ''Shneim Asar''; , ''Trei Asar'', "Twelve"; , "the Twelve Prophets"; , "the Twelve Prophets"), or the Book of the Twelve, is a collection of twelve prophetic works traditionally attributed to individual prophets, likely compiled into a single anthology by the Persian period. It contains diverse literary forms and themes. Scholarly debate continues over the dating and editorial history of these texts. In the Tanakh, they appear as a single book, "The Twelve", which is the last book of the ''

Nevi'im The (; ) is the second major division of the Hebrew Bible (the ''Tanakh''), lying between the () and (). The Nevi'im are divided into two groups. The Former Prophets ( ) consists of the narrative books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings ...

'', the second of three major divisions of the Tanakh. In the Christian

Old Testament The Old Testament (OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew and occasionally Aramaic writings by the Isr ...

, the collection appears as twelve individual

books A book is a structured presentation of recorded information, primarily verbal and graphical, through a medium. Originally physical, electronic books and audiobooks are now existent. Physical books are objects that contain printed material, mo ...

, one for each of the prophets: the Book of Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah,

Jonah Jonah the son of Amittai or Jonas ( , ) is a Jewish prophet from Gath-hepher in the Northern Kingdom of Israel around the 8th century BCE according to the Hebrew Bible. He is the central figure of the Book of Jonah, one of the minor proph ...

, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Their order, and position in the Old Testament, varies slightly between the

Protestant Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that emphasizes Justification (theology), justification of sinners Sola fide, through faith alone, the teaching that Salvation in Christianity, salvation comes by unmerited Grace in Christianity, divin ...

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

and

Eastern Orthodox Eastern Orthodoxy, otherwise known as Eastern Orthodox Christianity or Byzantine Christianity, is one of the three main Branches of Christianity, branches of Chalcedonian Christianity, alongside Catholic Church, Catholicism and Protestantism ...

Bibles. The name "Minor Prophets" goes back to

Augustine of Hippo Augustine of Hippo ( , ; ; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430) was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Africa. His writings deeply influenced the development of Western philosop ...

, who distinguished the 12 shorter prophetic books as ''prophetae minores'' from the four longer books of the prophets Isaiah,

Jeremiah Jeremiah ( – ), also called Jeremias, was one of the major prophets of the Hebrew Bible. According to Jewish tradition, Jeremiah authored the Book of Jeremiah, book that bears his name, the Books of Kings, and the Book of Lamentations, with t ...

, Ezekiel, and Daniel. The twelve minor prophets are commemorated in various ways across Christian

liturgies Liturgy is the customary public ritual of worship performed by a religious group. As a religious phenomenon, liturgy represents a community, communal response to and participation in the sacred through activities reflecting praise, thanksgiving, ...

, including specific readings in the Roman Catholic Tridentine

Breviary A breviary () is a liturgical book used in Christianity for praying the canonical hours, usually recited at seven fixed prayer times. Historically, different breviaries were used in the various parts of Christendom, such as Aberdeen Breviar ...

and modern Lectionary throughout the

liturgical year The liturgical year, also called the church year, Christian year, ecclesiastical calendar, or kalendar, consists of the cycle of liturgical days and seasons that determines when feast days, including celebrations of saints, are to be obse ...

, and collectively honored on July 31 in the

Armenian Apostolic Church The Armenian Apostolic Church () is the Autocephaly, autocephalous national church of Armenia. Part of Oriental Orthodoxy, it is one of the most ancient Christianity, Christian churches. The Armenian Apostolic Church, like the Armenian Catholic ...

calendar.

Composition

Individual books

Scholars usually assume that there exists an original core of prophetic tradition behind each book which can be attributed to the figure after whom it is named. In general, each book includes three types of material: * Autobiographical material in the first person, some of which may go back to the prophet in question; * Biographical materials about the prophet in the third person – which incidentally demonstrate that the collection and editing of the books was completed by persons other than the prophets themselves; * Oracles or speeches by the prophets, usually in poetic form, and drawing on a wide variety of genres, including covenant lawsuit, oracles against the nations, judgment oracles, messenger speeches, songs, hymns, narrative, lament, law, proverb, symbolic gesture, prayer, wisdom saying, and vision. The noteworthy exception is the

Book of Jonah The Book of Jonah is one of the twelve minor prophets of the Nevi'im ("Prophets") in the Hebrew Bible, and an individual book in the Christian Old Testament where it has four chapters. The book tells of a Hebrew prophet named Jonah, son of Amitt ...

, an anonymous work which contains a

narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether non-fictional (memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travel literature, travelogue, etc.) or fictional (fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller ...

about the prophet Jonah.

As a collection

It is not known when these short works were collected and transferred to a single scroll, but the first extra-biblical evidence for the Twelve as a collection is c. 190 BCE in the writings of Yeshua ben Sirach, and evidence from the

Dead Sea Scrolls The Dead Sea Scrolls, also called the Qumran Caves Scrolls, are a set of List of Hebrew Bible manuscripts, ancient Jewish manuscripts from the Second Temple period (516 BCE – 70 CE). They were discovered over a period of ten years, between ...

suggests that the modern order of the

Tanakh The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. ''

Jerusalem during the Achaemenid period (538–332 BCE), although there is disagreement over whether this was early or late. The comparison of different ancient manuscripts indicates that the order of the individual books was originally fluid. The arrangement found in current Bibles is roughly chronological. First come those prophets dated to the early Assyrian period: Hosea, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, and Micah; Joel is undated, but it was possibly placed before Amos because parts of a verse near the end of Joel (3.16 '4.16 in Hebrew'' and one near the beginning of Amos (1.2) are identical. Also we can find in both Amos (4.9 and 7.1–3) and Joel a description of a plague of locusts. These are followed by prophets that are set in the later Assyrian period: Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah. Last come those set in the Persian period: Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, although some scholars date "Second Zechariah" to the Hellenistic Era. However it is important to note that chronology was not the only consideration, as "It seems that an emphatic focus on Jerusalem and Judah was lsoa main concern. For example, Obadiah is generally understood as reflecting the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE, and would therefore fit later in a purely chronological sequence.

Sequence of books

In the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
. '' anthology In book publishing, an anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler; it may be a collection of plays, poems, short stories, songs, or related fiction/non-fiction excerpts by different authors. There are also thematic and g ...

. The works appear in the same order in Jewish,

and Catholic Bibles, but in

Christian Bibles they are ordered according to the

Septuagint The Septuagint ( ), sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy (), and abbreviated as LXX, is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Biblical Hebrew. The full Greek ...

. The books are in rough chronological order, according to explicit statements within the books themselves. The twelve books are:

Academic debates

In the 21st century, “claims for Persian period influence or origins have ballooned.” The recent Oxford Handbook of the Minor Prophets Jason Radine summarizes the ongoing “Persian Turn” in Minor Prophets scholarship. It refers to a scholarly trend towards dating much of the biblical composition and editing of the Minor Prophets to the Persian period (539–323 BCE). This trend is rooted in earlier scholarly theories, such as the Graf-Wellhausen Hypothesis, which suggested that elements of the Pentateuch, particularly the “Priestly” writings, originated during the Persian era. Additionally, Spinoza’s 17th-century argument that Ezra authored large portions of the Hebrew Bible influenced this perspective. This trend has gained momentum as a growing number of scholars now posit that many prophetic books, once assumed to date from earlier periods, were likely finalized or significantly edited during the Persian period. Researchers like Reinhard Kratz distinguish between the original oracles of ancient Near Eastern prophets and the later literary works attributed to them, which reflect the scribal efforts of later editors. This theory has been opposed by other scholars, however. For instance, Heath Dewrell argues that many literary features of the Book of Hosea are also attested in Neo-Assyrian prophecies. Since these prophetic texts were written close to the time of Hosea and were not substantially edited centuries after their authors' time, Dewrell finds no reason to think that the biblical book underwent any major editing either. While dating texts from the Persian period is appropriate for books like Haggai and Zechariah, which explicitly mention that era, scholars caution against oversimplifying the dating process. Radine argues that categorizing too much biblical material as Persian-era production risks obscuring the complex, long-term development of biblical literature. In particular, the diversity of themes, literary styles, and theological perspectives in the Minor Prophets suggests that their formation spanned a much longer period than the Persian era alone. The scholar Ehud Ben Zvi suggests that much of the biblical material from the Persian period was produced within the relatively small and interconnected community of Jerusalem, where scribes were likely aware of each other’s works. Ben Zvi, Ehud. 2009. “The Concept of Prophetic Books and Its Historical Setting.” In The Production of Prophecy: Constructing Prophecy and Prophets in Yehud, edited by Diana V. Edelman and Ehud Ben Zvi, 73–95. London: Equinox. This view emphasizes the importance of understanding how these texts were shaped within their historical and cultural contexts. However, Radine argues that this approach risks overlooking earlier material that predated the Persian period but was later edited or integrated into these texts.

Christian commemoration

In the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

, the twelve minor prophets are read in the Tridentine

during the fourth and fifth weeks of November, which are the last two weeks of the

, before Advent. In Year 1 of the modern Lectionary, Haggai, Zechariah, Jonah, Malachi, and Joel are read in weeks 25–27 of Ordinary Time. In Year 2, Amos, Hosea, and Micah are read in weeks 14–16 of Ordinary Time. In Year 1 of the two-year cycle of the Office of Readings in the

Liturgy of the Hours The Liturgy of the Hours (), Divine Office (), or ''Opus Dei'' ("Work of God") are a set of Catholic prayers comprising the canonical hours, often also referred to as the breviary, of the Latin Church. The Liturgy of the Hours forms the official ...

, Micah 4 and 7 are read in the third week of Advent; Amos, Hosea, Micah, Zephaniah, Nahum, and Habakkuk are read in weeks 22–29 of Ordinary Time. In Year 2, Haggai and Zechariah 1–8 are read in weeks 11–12 of Ordinary Time; Obadiah, Joel, Malachi, Jonah, and Zechariah 9–14 are read in Week 18. They are collectively commemorated in the

Calendar of Saints The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context does n ...

of the

on July 31.

Composition

Individual books

As a collection

Sequence of books

Academic debates

Christian commemoration

See also

References

Further reading