Page 97 - A Dissertation for Doctor of Philosophy

pathos.” 105 The state of their mind was taken up into the very heart of the divine. Thus, they

tried to impart “the pathos of message together with its logos.” 106

One of important aspects of the prophets was their social consciousness. They were

passionately and critically involved in the historical life of their people in their own time. 107

They often confronted contemporary societies and their cultures in God’s name by providing “an

alternative consciousness” against their “culture’s dominant consciousness.” 108 There exists a

certain pattern in prophetic ministry: historical crisis, indictment, threat, and call to change. 109

Prophets are culture critics. 110 Walter Brueggermann confirms this: “The task of prophetic

ministry is to nurture, nourish, and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the

consciousness and perception of the dominant culture….” 111

105
Abraham J. Heschel, The Prophets (New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1962), 26.
106
Ibid.

107 Marcus J. Borg, Jesus, A New Vision: Spirit, Culture, and the Life of Discipleship
(New York: HarperCollins Publisher, 1987), 150.
108 Ibid. For Borg’s concept of the consciousness, see Ibid., 81. He comments that “At the
heart of every social construction of reality is the ‘conventional wisdom’ of that culture.
Conventional wisdom consists of the widely shared central assumptions about life which
together comprise a culture’s ‘dominant consciousness.’ Most essentially, it consists of a picture
of reality and a picture of how to live, a ‘worldview,’ and an ‘ethos,’ or way of life.”
109
Ibid., 151-57. See also, Marcus J. Borg, Conflict, Holiness & Politics in the Teaching
of Jesus (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1984), 52.

110
Ibid., 155.
111 Walter Brueggermann, The Prophetic Imagination (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press,
1978), 13.