I was interested in the chapter on ‘re-reading the prophets’ in this Marcus Borg book I am reading, ‘Reading the Bible Again for the First Time.’ He says that the message of the prophets, in terms of their call for a just society, has been largely muted in the church since the time of Constantine, when the church became part of the establishment. The message of the prophets became domesticated by thinking of them mainly as prophecies of the coming Messiah.

‘The vision of the prophets, that is, rather than being thought of as a call for a just society, and as a result as an indictment of domination systems such as existed in the days of the prophets as well as today, are instead made non-threatening as referring to the future Kingdom of God that will happen at some time in the ultimate future.’

‘In much of Christian history, their voices [the prophets] have not been clearly heard. They have usually been domesticated, most often by those choosing to see them as predictors of Jesus as the messiah. The domestication is to a large extent the product of Christendom, the wedding of Christianity with Western culture (a union that began with Constantine in the fourth century and ended only recently).’

In fact he seems the end of Christianity’s dominance in the culture as an opportunity for the message of the prophets to once again be heard.

He also says that we tend to think of the word ‘justice’ as depicted by the prophets in terms of the criminal justice system as we know it. But it is a much richer word in the Bible and refers not just to equality under the law but also to the just-ness of society as a whole.