Reading the Prophets

While the 21st century has not brought us personal planes or reliable cures to life-ending diseases, it has brought us massive portable libraries and access to radio stations across the globe.  A Jewish source, Sefaria, comprises the spectrum of sources from Parsha Bereshit to more recent commentary, much translated to English.  I took it upon myself to read the English translation of the poetic prophets, accelerated in pace by the quarantine.  I've only got about half of Zechariah and all of Jeremiah to go, giving myself advance credit for having read the translation of Jonah on many Yom Kippur afternoons.  Reading them as primary sources has its challenges.  God is often not really that flattering individual worthy of imitatio dei.  He has a wicked temper and can be a narcissist, as much of Ezekiel describes.  The twelve short books all seem to blend together and many do not seem to have a coherent theme.  There is context that I don't appreciate and chapter divisions that seem artificial.  Their inclusion was chosen from among many options by an editor so why these were selected, particularly the obscure prophetic books will need some exploration.  Once I finish, I think it will be helpful to re-read the short ones and follow along the yutorah.org analyses of some of them.

We can read Nevi'im or we can read about Nevi'im.  Nothing really replaces the primary source, even if I depend on the translation.