The word "prophet" is derived from the Hebrew word "Nabi" which means one who proclaims. When the Hebrew "Nabi" was translated into Greek, "prophetes" was the word used. The meanings of this word are, "one who speaks for another", "one who knows beforehand what is going to happen" and so on. Though the prophets of Israel were those who prophesied what was yet to come, they were chiefly known as those who spoke for Yahweh. God specially appoints certain people (Jer. 1:4-5; Is. 6-8:13) and places his word on their lips. (Jer. 1:9). The prophets spoke to the people with the preface, "The Lord says ". They always possessed the awareness that they were spokesmen for God. We can say that in Israel the origin of the prophets was with the reign of kings. In ancient times prophets were chiefly known as seers and those who had ecstatic experience. They resided in places associated with local shrines and people flocked to them to discern God's will. Among the prophets of olden days Elijah and Elisha played an important role in the history of Israel. In course of time, they came to be known as people who proclaimed the message of God. The contents of their proclamation were chiefly : 1. Belief in one God. 2. Fidelity to God. 3. Repentance for sin. 4. Turning back to God. In some prophetic utterances we can also see prophecies regarding the Messiah yet to come and his mission (Is. 7:14; 61:1;Mic. 5:12; Num. 9:9; 12:10).

The prophets made use of sermons, discourses, counsel, reproach, threats, allegations, proverbs, parables, symbolic acts and political compositions in order to transmit the divine message. In the history of Israel there were numerous prophets from Moses to John the Baptist. All of these were chiefly teachers not writers. However, a few were also writers. (Is. 8:1-4;30:8;Ez. 43:11-12; Jer. 36:2). Later their disciples wrote down the words of the prophets and published them. That is why the declamatory style is more prevalent in the prophetic books. In the Bible those prophets who have books credited to them are called "writer prophets" and those who have no books in their own name are called "non-writer prophets". The chief prophets who belong to this category are Elijah and Elisha.

In the Bible the prophetic books are classified according to their size, not in their chronological order. The prophetic books are:

1. 8th century B C: Amos, Hosea, Isaiah (1-39), Micah

2. 7th century B C: Zephania, Nahum, Habakkuk, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Isaiah (40-55)

3. 6th century B C: Isaiah (56-66), Haggai, Zechariah

4. 5th century B C: Malachi, Jonas, Obadiah

5. 4th century B C: Joel

6. 2nd century B C: Daniel