Old Testament: Prophetic Traditions Review
You could say that Aba Paul Nadim Tarazi is addicted to Scripture. He preaches it, teaches it, speaks about it, writes about it, and has fathered many children from it. Glory be to God. Tarazi's book Old Testament: Prophetic Traditions inserts you into the Scriptural realm - and once you are there, escape is not an option. The Scriptural realm is from Genesis - John's Revelation, but this book, as its title so lucidly shouts, is about the nebeem (the prophets).
The nebeem are the mouthpieces of the Lord. It does not have to be a full-time job. You can be an acorn collector, and God can use you. You can be an affluent priest with ties to the ruling class, and God can use you. The Lord God can use you for 66 chapters (Isaiah) of instruction or for one (Obadiah). If you are used by the Lord, then you are giving a critical word (message) that a given people in a given time need to hear in order to repent for the coming final judgment, and that diverse peoples in the future can functionally apply to their situations.
Like Ge'ez and Amharic, Hebrew and Aramaic are Semitic tongues. Here are the similarities I found between these tongues, because of Tarazi's passion for the original linguistic context and indeed the entire dialectic of context: bisser (bisrat-proclamation of good news), shalom (selam-peace), qinah (qinay-lamentation, poetry), saddiq (ssidq-righteousness), and ketubeem (kitab-writing/s).
All Ethiopian Orthodox Christians, and indeed all Christians, should read Old Testament: Prophetic Traditions. It will push you to read and reread and reread again the former prophets, the major prophets, and the minor prophets. But, never forget, that the word of each prophet is weighted equally, because it comes not from human commission (flesh) nor through human authorities (flesh), but from God.
Furthermore, we must love each other.