Start next week’s search.
Follow the manual’s reading. Explore the rest of the book. Bring a question to the scriptures before Sunday.
Reading weeks run from November 2 through Christmas. Each guide gives you a question and a passage to read first.
Who was speaking—and under which king?
Kings named in the prophets’ opening verses run down the left. Isaiah is highlighted. A prophet may appear under several kings.
Jonah’s opening is undated; 2 Kings 14:25 places him in Jeroboam’s reign. Habakkuk’s opening names no king; Scripture Helps places him among Jeremiah’s contemporaries.
Already studying Jeremiah? Jeremiah 1–29 · Jeremiah 30–52 and Lamentations.
Ezekiel
- The manual’s reading
- Ezekiel 1–3; 33–34; 36–37; 47“A New Spirit Will I Put within You”
- The whole book
- All 48 chapters (the manual assigns 8).
Where he stands: After Isaiah. His first vision is dated “the fifth year of king Jehoiachin’s captivity” (Ezekiel 1:2).
“I will set up one shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David” (34:23); “my servant David a prince among them” (34:24); “David my servant shall be king over them” (37:24); “my servant David shall be their prince for ever” (37:25). The same thread runs through Jeremiah 30:9.
Ezekiel watched the glory of the Lord leave the temple by the east gate. Did it ever come back?
Read first: Ezekiel 11:23, then 43:1–5. “And the glory of the LORD came into the house by the way of the gate whose prospect is toward the east” (43:4).
Ezekiel saw a river flow out from under the temple door. Where does it go, and what does it heal?
Read first: Ezekiel 47:1–12.
Daniel
- The manual’s reading
- Daniel 1–7“There Is No Other God That Can Deliver”
- The whole book
- All 12 chapters, including the visions in 8–12.
Where he stands: After Isaiah. Daniel opens “In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim” (Daniel 1:1).
A stone cut out without hands became a mountain that filled the whole earth. Whose kingdom is it?
Read first: Daniel 2:34–45.
Hosea; Joel
- The manual’s reading
- Hosea 1–6; 10–14; Joel“I Will Love Them Freely”
- The whole book
- All 14 chapters of Hosea (the manual assigns 11) and all of Joel.
Where he stands: Hosea is beside Isaiah. He prophesied under “Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah” (Hosea 1:1), the same kings as Isaiah 1:1. Joel is undated.
“Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the LORD their God, and David their king; and shall fear the LORD and his goodness in the latter days” (Hosea 3:5).
Joel 2:28–32. Joseph said Moroni quoted it and “said that this was not yet fulfilled, but was soon to be” (Joseph Smith—History 1:41).
Joel promised the Lord would pour out His Spirit on all flesh. Moroni told Joseph Smith it wasn’t yet fulfilled. Is it now?
Read first: Joel 2:28–32; Joseph Smith—History 1:41.
Amos; Obadiah; Jonah
- The manual’s reading
- Amos; Obadiah; Jonah“Seek the Lord, and Ye Shall Live”
- The whole book
- All three are assigned in full. The companion covers what the lesson doesn’t explore.
Where he stands: Amos is beside Isaiah, at the start. He prophesied “in the days of Uzziah” (Amos 1:1). Jonah is placed by 2 Kings 14:25 in the reign of Jeroboam of Israel. Obadiah is undated.
“In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen” (Amos 9:11). James quotes it at the Jerusalem council (Acts 15:16).
Jonah’s book ends on a question from the Lord, and Jonah never answers it. How would you?
Read first: Jonah 4.
Amos says the Lord does nothing without first revealing it to His prophets. What has He revealed that you haven’t acted on yet?
Read first: “Surely the Lord GOD will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7).
Micah; Nahum; Habakkuk; Zephaniah
- The manual’s reading
- Micah; Nahum; Habakkuk; Zephaniah“He Delighteth in Mercy”
- The whole book
- All four books, read alongside Isaiah.
Where he stands: Micah is beside Isaiah. His book names “Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah” (Micah 1:1). Zephaniah is after Isaiah, prophesying in the days of Josiah (Zephaniah 1:1). Habakkuk is after Isaiah; the Church’s Scripture Helps names him among Jeremiah’s contemporaries. Nahum is undated.
Micah 5:2 names Bethlehem, the town Luke calls “the city of David” (Luke 2:4).
Isaiah 2:1–4 (Cowdery 1835). That’s Isaiah’s copy of the same promise Micah gives in 4:1–3.
Isaiah’s tool to watch: Shared passages. Isaiah 2:2–4 and Micah 4:1–3 are nearly word for word, and commentators still debate which came first. Nahum 1:15 repeats Isaiah 52:7’s “feet of him that bringeth good tidings.”
Isaiah and Micah preached the same promise in almost the same words. Who said it first, and why do both books have it?
Read first: Isaiah 2:2–4 beside Micah 4:1–3; Isaiah 52:7 beside Nahum 1:15.
Micah named the small town the ruler of Israel would come from. Which town, and whose town was it already?
Read first: Micah 5:2; Luke 2:4.
Haggai; Zechariah
- The manual’s reading
- Haggai 1–2; Zechariah 1–4; 7–14“Holiness unto the Lord”
- The whole book
- All of Haggai and all 14 chapters of Zechariah (the manual skips Zechariah 5 and 6).
Where he stands: Long after Isaiah, back from exile. Both books are dated “in the second year of Darius” (Haggai 1:1; Zechariah 1:1).
“The house of David shall be as God” (Zechariah 12:8); “In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness” (13:1).
In a chapter the manual skips, Zechariah is told, “Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH.” Who is he?
Read first: Zechariah 6:12–13, then 3:8.
Malachi
- The manual’s reading
- Malachi“I Have Loved You, Saith the Lord”
- The whole book
- Assigned in full. The risen Lord gave chapters 3–4 to the Nephites (3 Nephi 24–25) because “These scriptures, which ye had not with you, the Father commanded that I should give unto you” (3 Nephi 26:2).
Where he stands: Undated. His book names no king; it closes the Old Testament.
Part of Malachi 3 and all of Malachi 4, with 4:5–6 “with a little variation” (Joseph Smith—History 1:36–39; D&C 2). Cowdery’s letters identify Malachi 3:1–4.
Malachi’s last promise is that Elijah would come before the great day of the Lord. Did he?
Read first: Malachi 4:5–6; D&C 110:13–16.
Christmas
- The manual’s reading
- Christmas“We Have Waited for Him, and He Will Save Us”
- The whole book
- The whole Old Testament, looking forward to one birth.
Where it stands: Gather the promises of Christ’s coming from across the year’s reading.
Isaiah 11:1, the rod “out of the stem of Jesse,” David’s father; Micah 5:2, Bethlehem.
Isaiah 11, all of it. Joseph wrote that Moroni “said that it was about to be fulfilled” (Joseph Smith—History 1:40).
Which promises of His birth did you find in the Old Testament this year?
Read first: Isaiah 7:14; Isaiah 9:6; Isaiah 11:1; Micah 5:2.
