The Neviʾim (Prophets)
The canon of the Prophets
The Hebrew canon of the section of the Old Testament known as the Nevi’im, or the Prophets, is divided into two sections: the Former Prophets and the Latter Prophets. The Former Prophets contains four historical books—Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings. The Latter Prophets includes four prophetic works—the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Twelve (Minor) Prophets. The Twelve Prophets, formerly written on a single scroll, includes the books of Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Thus, in the Hebrew canon of the Prophets there are, in effect, eight books.
The Christian canon of the Prophets does not include the Former Prophets section in its division of the Prophets; instead, it calls the books in this section Historical Books. In addition to Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel, the Christian canon of the Prophets includes two works from the division of the Hebrew canon known as the Ketuvim (the Writings): the Lamentations of Jeremiah and the Book of Daniel. The Twelve (Minor) Prophets are separated into individual books. The number of works in the Christian canon, however, varies. The Protestant canon contains all the books of the Latter Prophets and the two books from the Ketuvim, thus listing 17 works among the prophetic writings. The Roman Catholic canon accepts one other book as a canonical prophetic work, namely, Baruch (including the Letter of Jeremiah); the number of prophetic writings in the Roman Catholic canon is, therefore, 18. The Greek Orthodox Synod of Jerusalem in 1672 did not accept Baruch as canonical.
As far as the Former Prophets is concerned, the Protestant canon, following the Septuagint, separates Samuel and Kings into two sections each: I and II Samuel, and I and II Kings. The Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches in the past divided these two works into I, II, III, and IV Kings, but most Roman Catholic translations now follow the listing as it is in the Septuagint.