The Book of Malachias (Malachi)

Malachias is the twelfth and last of the minor prophets, the last prophetic voice of the Old Testament before the Forerunner. Modern Bibles call the book Malachi; the Douay-Rheims keeps the Vulgate form, Malachias. It has only four chapters, yet the Church reads it on Candlemas, Trent appeals to it for the Sacrifice of the Mass, and St Mark opens his Gospel with its promised messenger. Each chapter page sets the Latin Vulgate beside the Douay-Rheims.

Who wrote the Book of Malachi?

The book names its author in its first verse: "The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by the hand of Malachias" (Malachias 1:1). The Church has received it as the work of this prophet, and because it closes the Twelve, he has long been regarded as the last of the canonical prophets of the Old Testament. Of his life nothing else is recorded; all we know of him, as the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia says, "is summed up in the tenor of his preaching and the approximate period of his ministry."

His name means "my messenger" or "my angel", probably a shortened form of Mal'akhiyah, "messenger of the Lord". The Septuagint read the verse as "by the hand of his angel", but the Catholic Encyclopedia judges it more probable that Malachias is the proper name of a man, or a title that served as one.

An old Jewish opinion identified him with Esdras (Ezra) the scribe. St Augustine reports it on the authority of St Jerome: Malachias "is by some (for Jerome tells us that this is the opinion of the Hebrews) identified with Ezra the priest" (City of God XX.25). The Catholic Encyclopedia regards this as "without historical value".

The Pontifical Biblical Commission issued no decree on Malachias. Many modern scholars take the name for a heading borrowed from "my angel" in 3:1, or assign the closing verses to another hand; the Catholic Encyclopedia holds the unity of the book, "taken as a whole", to be "unquestionable".

When was the Book of Malachi written?

The book names no king, but its details place it after the return from Babylon. The Temple stands and sacrifice is offered, yet worship has grown slack. The people are ruled by a governor, the Persian peha (1:8). The abuses the prophet attacks, marriages with idolaters, neglected tithes and lax priests, are exactly those that 2 Esdras (Nehemiah) sets out to reform.

The Catholic Encyclopedia therefore dates the book shortly before Nehemias' first mission to Jerusalem in 445 BC, "about 450 B.C."; Challoner calls him a contemporary of Nehemias who "flourished about four hundred years before Christ". He follows Aggeus (Haggai) and Zacharias (Zechariah), who had urged the rebuilding of the Temple; St Augustine groups the three as the prophets of "the close of the captivity" (City of God XVIII.35).

What is the Book of Malachi about? A summary

Malachias writes in a form all his own. God makes a statement, the people object, "Wherein?", and God answers. "I have loved you, saith the Lord: and you have said: Wherein hast thou loved us?" (1:2). The pattern returns throughout (1:6, 2:14, 2:17, 3:7, 3:8, 3:13), which is why the book is called a series of disputations. The Catholic Encyclopedia divides it into two parts, from 1:2 to 2:16 and from 2:17 to the end, closed by a double epilogue.

God's love and the polluted sacrifices (chapter 1)

Chapter 1 opens with God's free love: "I have loved Jacob, but have hated Esau", whose land of Edom lies waste. Then the Lord turns on the priests: "If then I be a father, where is my honour? and if I be a master, where is my fear?" They bring the blind, the lame and the sick for victims: "offer it to thy prince, if he will be pleased with it." God would rather the Temple doors were shut, and announces a sacrifice to replace theirs: "from the rising of the sun even to the going down, my name is great among the Gentiles, and in every place there is sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean oblation" (1:11).

The covenant of Levi and the wife of thy youth (chapter 2)

Chapter 2 sets before the priests the model of Levi: "The law of truth was in his mouth, and iniquity was not found in his lips." It defines the priest's office: "the lips of the priest shall keep knowledge, and they shall seek the law at his mouth: because he is the angel of the Lord of hosts" (2:7). Then the prophet turns to the people: Juda has "married the daughter of a strange god", and men have put away their wives, so that the altar is covered "with tears". God is witness "between thee, and the wife of thy youth, whom thou hast despised: yet she was thy partner, and the wife of thy covenant" (2:14). It ends with the taunt, "Where is the God of judgment?"

The Lord comes to His temple; tithes and the book of remembrance (chapter 3)

Chapter 3 answers with the great promise: "Behold I send my angel, and he shall prepare the way before my face. And presently the Lord, whom you seek, and the angel of the testament, whom you desire, shall come to his temple" (3:1). He comes as "a refining fire" to purify the sons of Levi "as gold, and as silver", and to judge the oppressors of the hireling, the widow and the stranger. "I am the Lord, and I change not ...

Return to me, and I will return to you." The people have robbed God "in tithes and in firstfruits"; if they bring the tithes into the storehouse, He will open "the flood-gates of heaven". To those who say it is vain to serve God, He answers with the book of remembrance "written before him for them that fear the Lord, and think on his name" (3:16), which St Augustine understood of the New Testament (City of God XVIII.35).

The day of the Lord, the Sun of justice and Elias (chapter 4)

Chapter 4, which the Hebrew Bible counts as the end of chapter 3 (3:19–24), describes the day that comes "kindled as a furnace", when the proud shall be stubble. "But unto you that fear my name, the Sun of justice shall arise, and health in his wings" (4:2). The book closes with two charges: "Remember the law of Moses my servant", and the promise that Elias will come "before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord" to turn the hearts of fathers and children to one another (4:4–6).

The message of Malachi and the Catholic reading

The clean oblation: the Sacrifice of the Mass. No verse of Malachias has been quoted more by the Church than 1:11. The Didache applies it to the Sunday Eucharist: "In every place and time offer to me a pure sacrifice; for I am a great King" (Didache 14). St Irenaeus says that Christ "taught the new oblation of the new covenant; which the Church receiving from the apostles, offers to God throughout all the world", and that Malachias "thus spoke beforehand" of it (Against Heresies IV.17.5).

The Council of Trent made this reading its own: the Mass "is indeed that clean oblation, which cannot be defiled by any unworthiness, or malice of those that offer it; which the Lord foretold by Malachias was to be offered in every place, clean to his name" (Session XXII, chapter 1). Challoner's note says the same: the clean oblation is "the precious body and blood of Christ in the eucharistic sacrifice"; see the Eucharist.

The messenger and the Lord of the temple. Our Lord applied 3:1 to St John the Baptist: "For this is he of whom it is written: Behold I send my angel before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee" (Matthew 11:10), and St Mark opens his Gospel with the same words (Mark 1:2). Challoner's note: "John the Baptist, the messenger of God, and forerunner of Christ"; see St John the Baptist. "The Lord, whom you seek" and "the angel of the testament" are one Person, as the Catholic Encyclopedia shows: God Himself comes to His temple. When the Child Jesus is carried into the Temple, the Lord comes to it; so the Church reads Malachias 3:1–4 at the Mass of the Purification on 2 February; see Candlemas.

The refining fire. St Augustine reads 3:2–3 of the last judgment, and concludes that "some shall in the last judgment suffer some kind of purgatorial punishments" (City of God XX.25); see Purgatory.

Marriage and divorce. "Despise not the wife of thy youth" (2:15). The Catholic Encyclopedia notes that his words on divorce "by reason of aversion" look back to the bill of divorce of Deuteronomy 24. The Douay of 2:16, following the Vulgate, reads "When thou shalt hate her put her away" where modern versions have "I hate divorce", and Challoner explains that iniquity covers "every man that putteth away his wife without just cause; notwithstanding that God permitted it in the law, to prevent the evil of murder." Our Lord withdrew that permission and restored marriage to what it was "from the beginning" (Matthew 19).

Tithes. Malachias 3:8–10 is the classic text on tithing. The fault was to withhold from God the support of His house and ministers; the blessing promised is not a bargain for riches. See what the Bible says about tithing.

The Sun of justice. The Church reads 4:2 of Christ: on 21 December the great antiphon of Advent at Vespers hails Him, O Oriens, splendor lucis aeternae, et sol justitiae, "O Dawn of the East, brightness of light eternal, and Sun of justice", four days before Christmas.

Elias before the judgment. The angel told Zachary that his son would go before the Lord "in the spirit and power of Elias; that he may turn the hearts of the fathers unto the children" (Luke 1:17), and Our Lord said of John, "he is Elias that is to come" (Matthew 11:14). Yet after the Transfiguration He said, "Elias indeed shall come, and restore all things.

But I say to you, that Elias is already come" (Matthew 17:11–12), and the Fathers drew from this a double fulfilment. St Augustine calls it "a familiar theme in the conversation and heart of the faithful, that in the last days before the judgment the Jews shall believe in the true Christ ... by means of this great and admirable prophet Elias", taken up alive in 4 Kings 2 (City of God XX.29); Ecclesiasticus 48 already awaits him "to reconcile the heart of the father to the son".

Famous verses of Malachi

Malachi 1:2–3. "I have loved Jacob, but have hated Esau" (Malachias 1:2–3), quoted by St Paul in Romans 9:13. Challoner explains that God favoured Jacob's posterity "above their deserts".

Malachi 3:1 (the Lord suddenly comes to His temple). "And presently the Lord, whom you seek ... shall come to his temple" (Malachias 3:1). Modern versions say "suddenly"; the Vulgate has statim.

Malachi 3:10 (tithes). "Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in my house ... if I open not unto you the flood-gates of heaven, and pour you out a blessing even to abundance" (Malachias 3:10).

Malachi 4:2 (the Sun of justice). "Unto you that fear my name, the Sun of justice shall arise, and health in his wings" (Malachias 4:2); Hebrew 3:20.

Malachi 4:5–6 (Elias). "Behold I will send you Elias the prophet ... And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers" (Malachias 4:5–6).

Malachi in the canon and in the liturgy

Malachias closes the Book of the Twelve in the Hebrew, the Septuagint and the Vulgate, and the Council of Trent, Session IV (1546), names it last among the minor prophets in its decree on the canon. Being protocanonical, it stands in Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant Bibles alike. The Hebrew has three chapters; the Septuagint, the Vulgate, the Douay-Rheims Bible and the King James make the last six verses a fourth.

In Protestant Bibles Malachi is the last book of the Old Testament, which gives the impression of "four hundred silent years" before St Matthew. In the Catholic Bible the Old Testament continues with 1 Machabees and 2 Machabees, the history of the second century before Christ; Ecclesiasticus was written in the same century. These are among the deuterocanonical books that Protestant Bibles left out.

On the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Candlemas, 2 February) the 1962 Missal reads Malachias 3:1–4 as the Lesson: Ecce ego mitto Angelum meum. The Introit of the Epiphany, Ecce advenit dominator Dominus, echoes 3:1, and on the feast of St Irenaeus (3 July) the Introit is Malachias 2:6, Lex veritatis fuit in ore ejus. In the Breviary the minor prophets are read at Matins in November, as the liturgical year closes and Advent draws near; the liturgical calendar shows each day.

How to read the Book of Malachi

The four chapters take about fifteen minutes; read them straight through first. Then read Aggeus and the last chapter of 2 Esdras to meet the community Malachias addressed. Return to chapter 1 before Mass, to chapter 3 at Candlemas and in Advent, and to chapter 4 beside the first chapter of St Luke's Gospel, where the angel takes up its last verse.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the Book of Malachi about?

The Book of Malachi (Malachias) is a four-chapter prophecy to the Jews returned from Babylon, in the fifth century before Christ. It rebukes priests who offer defective sacrifices and a people who marry idolaters, divorce and withhold tithes, and it foretells the clean oblation, the Lord coming to His temple after a messenger, the day of judgment, and Elias.

What is the main message of the Book of Malachi?

God, who loves His people freely and "changes not" (3:6), demands sincere worship, faithful priests and faithful marriages, and will come in person to purify them: "Return to me, and I will return to you" (3:7). Christians read in it the promise of the Mass (1:11) and of the Forerunner (3:1).

Who wrote the Book of Malachi?

The Church has received it as the work of the prophet Malachias, whose name, meaning "my messenger", stands in its first verse. Nothing else is known of his life. An old Jewish opinion reported by St Jerome identified him with Esdras the scribe, but the Catholic Encyclopedia regards this as without historical value.

When was the Book of Malachi written?

After the return from exile, when the Temple had been rebuilt and a Persian governor ruled Judea. The 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia dates it about 450 BC, shortly before Nehemias came to Jerusalem in 445 BC, since the abuses Malachias condemns are those Nehemias reformed. Challoner makes him a contemporary of Nehemias.

How many chapters are in the Book of Malachi?

Four in the Douay-Rheims, the Vulgate, the Septuagint and the King James Version; the Hebrew Bible has three, counting the last six verses as 3:19–24. You can read all four chapters here, Latin and English side by side.

Is Malachi the last book of the Old Testament?

In Protestant Bibles, yes. In the Catholic Bible, where it is named in the canon of the Council of Trent (1546), Malachias is the last of the prophets, but the Old Testament continues with 1 and 2 Machabees. In the Hebrew Bible the last book is Chronicles (Paralipomenon).

How many years are there between Malachi and Matthew?

Malachias prophesied about 450 BC, some four and a half centuries before Christ. Those years are not silent in the Catholic Bible: the books of Machabees recount the persecution under Antiochus in the second century before Christ. St Mark then opens his Gospel with the words of Malachias 3:1, applied to John the Baptist.

What does the Book of Malachi say about tithing?

In Malachias 3:8–10 God accuses the people of robbing Him "in tithes and in firstfruits" and promises to open "the flood-gates of heaven" if they bring all the tithes into the storehouse. The tithe supported the Temple, its priests and the poor; it was a debt of religion, not a way of buying riches from God.

Who is Elias in the Book of Malachi?

Elias (Elijah) is the prophet taken up in a fiery chariot, whom God promises to send "before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord" (4:5). Our Lord said that John the Baptist "is Elias that is to come" (Matthew 11:14), and also that "Elias indeed shall come" (Matthew 17:11); St Augustine and the Fathers taught that Elias himself will return before the judgment to bring the Jews to Christ.

Read the whole Book of Malachias verse by verse, in Latin and English side by side, in the Iter Fidei Catholic Bible app.

Sources. The Prophecy of Malachias, with Matthew 11, 17 and 19, Mark 1, Luke 1, Romans 9, Ecclesiasticus 48, 4 Kings 2, Deuteronomy 24 and 2 Esdras (Douay-Rheims, Challoner revision, with Challoner's preface and notes; Clementine Vulgate); Didache 14; St Irenaeus, Against Heresies IV.17.5; St Augustine, City of God XVIII.35, XX.25 and XX.29; Council of Trent, Session IV, Decree on the Canonical Scriptures (1546), and Session XXII, chapter 1 (1562); Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), "Malachias (Malachi)"; Roman Missal (1962), Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Epiphany, St Irenaeus; Roman Breviary (1962), Matins of November and the antiphon O Oriens (21 December).