Overview of Malachi's Three-Part Structure

OVERVIEW OF MALACHI by E. Ray Clendenen Bible and Reference Editor B&H Publishing After 70 years of exile, God’s people had returned to their homeland in the Persian province of Judah. The temple had been rebuilt (515 BC) and worship established. But the excitement and enthusiasm for which the prophets Haggai and Zechariah were the catalysts had waned. As Malachi stood to address the crowd, he faced cynicism, hypocrisy, and spiritual apathy. Times were hard. He also faced a failure of leadership. With three interrelated addresses, Malachi confronted three problems. First, the priests no longer served God wholeheartedly or the people conscientiously. They were insulting God with indifferent worship and had contributed to Judah’s indifference to God (1:2–2:9). Second, blaming their economic and social troubles on the Lord’s supposed unfaithfulness, the people were living selfish lives. Watching out only for themselves, they gave little more than a nod to their responsibilities to God or to one another (2:10–3:6). Third, the people also had a self-protective sense of ownership of their personal property, causing them not only to bring God their worst animals as “sacrifices,” but also to refuse to pay the tithes the temple personnel and the landless poor depended on (3:7–4:6). Priests and people were only interested in self and in “what’s in it for me.” Malachi’s first two addresses begin with positive motivation or hope (1:2–5; 2:10a) and end with warnings of judgment (2:1–9; 3:1–6). In the center are commands to stop the useless offerings (1:10) and to stop the faithless treatment of wives (2:15b–16). The commands are surrounded by descriptions of sinful behavior. The final climactic address begins and ends with commands to repent and obey (3:7–10a; 4:4–6). In the center is Malachi’s description of the people’s attitude: “It is useless to serve God” (3:14). Surrounding it is his description of the future blessings and judgment God will bring when He comes. Malachi introduces his series of three addresses with God’s declaration of love for His people (1:2–5). To motivate God’s demand for proper worship (1:6–14), for marital faithfulness (2:10b–17), and for wholehearted commitment to God, signified by acknowledging His ownership of all they had (3:7–4:6), the Lord reminded them in 1:2–5 that He had formed a permanent love-relationship with them, and He reminded them of His faithful love throughout their history. But Judah impertinently disputed God’s love, showing they had allowed life’s trials to blind them to His faithfulness and loving presence. Such spiritual impoverishment was at the root not only of Israel’s insulting religious rites (1:6–14), but also of the moral decay and spiritual indifference Malachi describes later. Malachi continues his first address exhorting the priests to honor the Lord (1:2–2:9) by describing their failure to honor the Lord (1:6–9). In v. 7 the temple altar is compared to a divinely hosted dinner table, a symbol of hospitality and relationship (see Ezk 44:16). A careless attitude toward the altar betrayed how little they valued their relationship with God. In v. 10, the Lord commands the priests to stop their useless offerings. Religious activity not rooted in humble adoration of God as the source of all goodness and authority is not only useless “fig-leaf religion” but is repulsive to Him because it slanders His character. Next Malachi describes how the priests’ worship is profaning the Lord’s name (1:11–14). A time is coming, he says, when even Gentiles everywhere will recognize Yahweh’s greatness and worship Him. But God’s own children, His kingdom of priests who were to mediate His grace to the nations, were “profaning His name.” God’s “name” is His nature, character, and worth as He reveals it in His words and acts. Those claiming to belong to Him proclaim his character in their worship and also their behavior. If their worship or behavior misrepresents God’s holy character, it “profanes” His name, i.e., it desecrates Him, damages His reputation, brings Him disgrace, and will not be tolerated. Malachi ended his first address by announcing to the priests the results of their disobedience (2:1–9). He would treat them with contempt (as they had done to Him) and remove them disgracefully from service. He would figuratively cart them away like so much “waste”—the dung and unclean sacrificial remains after a temple festival, which was disposed of “outside the camp” (Ex 29:14). Malachi’s second address is an exhortation of the people to be faithful to one another, especially their wives (2:10–3:6). It begins with a reminder that as members of God’s covenant community of Israel, they had responsibilities to one another as brothers and sisters (2:10a). Yet they were violating those responsibilities and acting faithlessly (2:10b–15a). The verb bagad, occurring throughout vv. 10–16, designates failure to fulfill one’s promised obligations, i.e., to “commit treachery.” One who does this can be called a “traitor” (Isa 21:2). The most obvious way Judah was violating (“profaning”) the Mosaic covenant (“covenant of our fathers”) was by intermarriage with women who worshipped a foreign god, thus introducing a spiritually destructive element into the covenant community. In order to marry pagan women, some men were divorcing their Jewish wives, to whom they had sworn faithfulness before God. Divorce is the second detestable act of treachery that was profaning the sanctuary (v. 11). Divorce profaned the sanctuary because they continued to sacrifice (v. 13) despite their marital betrayals. Persistent sin renders worship meaningless at best. In the middle of Malachi’s second address is a command to stop acting faithlessly (2:15b–16). Verse 16 ends by repeating v. 15b with one significant change. After speaking to “you” in vv. 13–15a, v. 15b switches unexpectedly back to third person “he” as in vv. 11–12, ending literally, “and with the wife of your youth let him not act treacherously.” Then is a verb that clearly means “he hates,” although most translations change it to “I hate.” But the subject apparently is the one who “acts treacherously,” and who also “covers his garment with injustice.” This verse specifies how wives were being betrayed: their husbands were “hating” so as to “divorce” them for selfish reasons (Dt 24:3), which was a heinous “injustice.” Such a cold-blooded and unscrupulous traitor to his marital responsibilities, who would deny his wife the very things he had pledged to provide—devotion, care, companionship, protection, intimacy, peace, justice—stood condemned by God, and he wore the stain of his crime like a garment for all to see (see Ps 73:6). Yet the people were complaining of the Lord’s injustice (2:17). God’s ironic reply is to announce in 3:1–6 a coming Messenger of “judgment” (or “justice,” v. 5), who would purge and purify God’s people, including the priests. God’s “messenger” here is the “voice … in the wilderness” of Is 40:3, which the NT interprets as the “Elijah” of Mal 4:5, fulfilled (provisionally) by John the Baptist. His goal would be to exhort the people to repent and prepare for God’s other “Messenger.” This divine-human “Messenger” is distinguished from God by referring to Him as “He,” and yet also identified with God by calling Him “the Lord” in v. 1 and “I” in v. 5. In the final address, Malachi exhorts Israel to “Return” and “Remember” (3:7–4:6). The address begins with the command to return to the Lord with tithes (3:7–10a). Bringing the tithes would be evidence of their return to the Lord because it signified their acknowledgement of His ownership of all they had. It also signified their willingness to support His appointed priests and Levites, and the landless poor. The obstacle to their repentance was their complacency toward serving the Lord (3:13–15). But the motivation would be the coming day of the Lord (3:16–4:3). God knows and will reward those who are His. God’s children who suffer the effects of life in an evil age and who sometimes feel forgotten by God should encourage one another that God has already marked a day on His calendar when He will come with compassion to retrieve His “special possession”—all who serve Him in faith. God promises to redemptively invade this world of darkness (symbolizing evil, ignorance, pain, and death) with “righteousness” as the “sun” invades the night, driving the darkness away. Other texts clarify that this image represents the Messiah whose coming will be celebrated like the dawn (Lk 1:76–79), often pictured as the “wings” of the sun. As a bird’s wings offer protection, God’s “wings” will bring healing to His children, who will never again fear “the wicked.” As the people of Israel wore tassels as constant reminders of God’s instructions, Malachi called them to remember, that is, be guided not by human wisdom, ambition, or societal expectations, but by the application of God’s “instruction” through Moses (4:4–6). Although provisionally fulfilled by John the Baptist, this prophecy of Elijah (mentioned 28 times in the New Testament) will be further fulfilled at Jesus’ return on the “great and awesome day of the LORD,” accompanied by a great revival of faith in Israel. Quoted in Lk 1:16–17, v. 6 describes a time of reconciliation when “the disobedient” accept the wisdom of “the righteous” and when “fathers” and their “children” will no longer live self-serving lives but will regard one another with compassion and respect. God's love demands that we love and worship Him with all our hearts, that we reproduce His love in our relations with one another, and that we acknowledge His ownership of all we have. We must not allow life's trials or life's blessings to blind us to His amazing love, His powerful presence, or His secure and unfailing promises. 4