Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble, and I'm your host for the Bible Recap.

Today we meet our first major prophet. We've already read two of the minor prophets,

Obadiah, which had one chapter, and Jonah, which had four. This book, on the other hand, is 66

chapters long. So that gives you a bit of an idea about what makes for the difference between

major prophets and minor prophets. It's not related to their quality of words, but to their

quantity of words. Isaiah's prophetic ministry spanned 40 years, so that's a lot of time to say a lot

of things.

It's especially helpful to notice where the quotation marks happen in books of prophecy.

Sometimes Isaiah's quoting God, sometimes he's telling us about a vision he saw, and

sometimes he's prophesying about what God said or showed him.

This can be a bit more challenging if you're reading the Bible with your ears instead of your

eyes. So if you're listening to an audio version and you find yourself getting confused, try to check

out a print version. By the way, if you are reading with your eyes, you'll notice that a lot of this

book is laid out like poetry. It's rich with images and metaphors, which means the more you dig, the more layers

of meaning you're likely to find. Two interesting facts about the book of Isaiah. First, it's the

Old Testament book that is quoted most often in the New Testament. And second, here's a brief,

fun history lesson. Scribes made lots of copies of the scriptures around the time of Jesus,

and they hid them in caves because the Roman army was oppressing them. In 1947, nearly 2,000

years later, the Dead Sea scrolls were discovered in a cave by the Dead Sea. In one of the ancient

clay pots, they discovered the entire book of Isaiah on one long scroll,

21 feet long, and today's Hebrew version of the book of Isaiah is the very same as that ancient copy,

to the very letter.

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