40 Fun Facts About Book of Malachi

Which prophet does Malachi 4:5 say God will send before the great and awesome day of the LORD?

Elijah never dies in the Bible's telling: a whirlwind carries him off alive in 2 Kings, which left room for the promise of a return.

Malachi 3:8 accuses the whole nation of robbing God by holding back offerings and what else?

Tithes means tenths, the share of the harvest owed to God, and the charge is levelled at the whole nation, not only at its priests.

Malachi 2:16 is often translated with the LORD, the God of Israel, saying he hates which practice?

Divorce is tied in the same verse to violence, which the man who sends his partner away is said to wear like a garment.

In most Christian Bibles Malachi closes the Old Testament, so which New Testament book comes next?

Matthew comes next only in Christian Bibles; the Hebrew Bible orders its books differently and puts Malachi at the end of its Prophets section instead.

The Gospels identify the forerunner of Malachi 3:1, sent to prepare the way, as which preacher?

John the Baptist is the one Jesus says the verse was written about, in a speech to the crowds that calls him more than a prophet.

In Malachi 1, God proves his love for Israel by saying he loved Jacob but hated which brother?

Esau was the elder twin, born first with Jacob following and holding his heel, yet the prophet says God's favour went to the younger.

The name Malachi, which may be a title, not a personal name, means what in Hebrew?

My messenger is all the Hebrew word says, and because it appears nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible as a name, some scholars doubt it was the author's own.

Malachi 3:10 promises that God will open what and pour out blessing without measure?

The windows of heaven is the King James phrase for the downpour of Noah's flood too, here turned from a threat into a promise of plenty.

Malachi 2:3 warns priests that God will spread what from their festival sacrifices on their faces?

Dung here is the waste of the animals killed at the feasts, and the verse adds that the priests themselves will be carried off with it.

In Malachi 4:2, the sun of righteousness rises with what in its wings for those who fear God?

Healing comes on the same day that, one verse earlier, burns like a furnace for the arrogant, so the dawn is good news only for some.

Malachi's final verse says the promised prophet will turn the hearts of fathers toward whom?

Their children is half of a two-way mending, since the same verse turns the hearts of the young back toward their fathers as well.

At which Jewish festival meal is a cup of wine set out for the prophet Malachi says will return?

Passover seders set out a cup of wine for him, and in many homes the door is opened partway through the night to invite him in.

Which composer set Malachi 3's refiner's fire passage in an oratorio first performed in Dublin?

Handel used the passage in Messiah, giving the prophet an aria and a chorus, with words that Charles Jennens compiled mostly from the King James Bible.

In Malachi 3:6, what does the LORD say of himself to explain why Jacob's descendants survive?

I do not change is given as the reason the nation has not been destroyed, and it leads straight into a plea for the people to return to him.

In the King James Bible, Malachi ends the Old Testament with a threat to smite the earth with what?

A curse is the last word in that translation, and when the passage is read in synagogue the verse before it is repeated so the reading does not end there.

Malachi 4:2 says those who fear God will go out and leap like which animals from the stall?

Calves let out of the stall are the picture of joy, and the next verse has the same people treading the wicked like ashes underfoot.

Where does Malachi 3:10 tell Israel to bring its full share, so there may be food in God's house?

The storehouse must be full so there is food in God's house, and the next verse promises in return that the vines and crops will not fail.

Malachi 3:2 says the coming Lord will be like a refiner's fire and like what else?

A launderer's soap is fullers' soap in older Bibles, and both pictures make one point: the day of his coming is a cleansing that few can endure.

In Malachi 3:10, God invites people to do what to him over the matter of their giving?

Test him is the challenge, and it comes with a result to check: blessing poured out until there is no room left for it.

Malachi 2:14 calls God a witness between a faithless man and whom, his companion by covenant?

The wife of his youth is the woman he married young and has now betrayed, and the passage says God no longer accepts his offerings because of it.

Malachi 1:8 dares priests to try offering their sick and lame sacrifices to which official instead?

Their governor is a clue to the date: the title points to the years after the exile, when Judah no longer had a king.

In Malachi 1:10, God wishes someone would do what to stop useless fires burning on his altar?

Shut the temple doors is the wish, because God says he takes no pleasure in the priests and will accept no offering from their hands.

In Malachi 1:4, which nation vows to rebuild its ruins, only for God to say he will demolish them?

Edom is told its territory will be called the Land of Wickedness, and Israel is promised it will watch this happen with its own eyes.

Malachi 2 says God made a covenant of life and peace with which ancestor of Israel's priests?

Levi is held up as the model the priests have abandoned: true instruction was in his mouth, and he turned many away from wrongdoing.

Malachi 2:13 pictures men covering the LORD's altar with what because their offerings are refused?

Tears flood the altar along with weeping and groaning, and the prophet says the cause is how the men have treated the women they married.

Malachi 3:16 says what was written before the LORD about those who feared him and honored his name?

A scroll of remembrance is drawn up after the God-fearing talk among themselves, and God, listening in, promises to treat them as his treasured possession.

Malachi 4:1 says all the arrogant and every evildoer will become what on the day that burns?

Stubble, the dry stalks left after harvest, catches at once, and the verse says the blaze will leave them neither root nor branch.

Malachi 4:4 says God gave Moses the law for all Israel at which mountain, often equated with Sinai?

Horeb is also where the prophet named in the very next verse once fled, walking forty days from Beersheba to reach it in 1 Kings.

Which apostle quotes Malachi on Jacob loved and his twin hated when writing about God's choice?

Paul cites the verse in Romans 9 to argue that God chose between the twins before they were born or had done anything good or bad.

Malachi dates from after the exile, in the period when Judah was ruled by which empire?

Persian rule is the setting nearly all scholars agree on, and the abuses the prophet attacks closely match those a returning official met in Jerusalem.

A Talmud tradition identifies the author of Malachi with which scribe and priest of the return?

Ezra fits because both men attack the same abuses, and the tradition would explain why his own book never mentions a prophet by that name.

Malachi is the last of the twelve Minor Prophets, so which prophet's book sits directly before it?

Zechariah, Haggai and Malachi close the collection as a trio, the three books set in the period after the return from exile.

Malachi 2:11 says Judah profaned the LORD's sanctuary by marrying the daughter of what?

A foreign god makes the charge a religious one, not only a family matter, and the verse calls it an abomination committed in Jerusalem itself.

In Malachi 3:5, which group heads the list of people God will swiftly testify against?

Sorcerers come first, but the list soon turns to everyday wrongs such as cheating workers of their wages and oppressing widows and orphans.

In Malachi 3:14, what do the people say about serving God that he calls harsh words against him?

It is futile, they say, pointing out that the arrogant are the ones who prosper and that evildoers challenge God and get away with it.

Modern Bibles have Malachi 1:3 leave the inheritance of Jacob's brother to which desert animals?

Jackals are the reading of modern versions, where the King James Bible has the more dramatic dragons of the wilderness; the mountains are left a wasteland either way.

Malachi 2:9 says the priests were despised by the people for showing what in matters of the law?

Partiality in applying the law is the charge, and the penalty mirrors the offence: priests who played favourites are themselves humiliated in public.

Malachi 2:15 says the LORD made a married couple one because he is seeking what from them?

Godly offspring is the stated purpose, which is why the verse ends by telling husbands to guard their spirits and keep faith with their partners.

Tradition places the tomb of Malachi and two fellow prophets on which hill overlooking Jerusalem?

Mount of Olives tradition is medieval; archaeologists date the burial cave there to the first century BC, centuries after the three prophets lived.

Malachi 2:7 says the lips of a priest should preserve what, so people seek instruction from him?

Knowledge is what a priest's lips should guard, yet the very next verse says the teaching of these priests has caused many to stumble.