The name of the writer is the title of this book.
"Malachi"means "my messenger."We know nothing of the prophet's parentage, ancestral or tribal roots, geographical origin, or other vocation. All we know is that he received and communicated the word of Yahweh to the Jews of his day.
Some scholars have tried to prove that "Malachi"was not the name of a prophet but the title of an anonymous prophet. None of the references to this book in the New Testament mention Malachi by name (cf. Matt. 11:10; Mark 1:2; Luke 7:27). The arguments for anonymity rest on four points.1First, "Malachi"is a title rather than a name in its form. The Septuagint translators rendered it "my messenger"in 1:1. However, it could be a short form of a name such as Malachiyyah, "messenger of Yahweh."There are several other shortened forms of names similar to this in the Old Testament (e.g., abiin 2 Kings 18:2, cf. abiyyahin 2 Chron. 29:1; and uriin 1 Kings 4:19, cf. uriyyahin 1 Chron. 11:41).
Second, the Targum did not consider Malachi the writer but ascribed this book to Ezra.2The Talmud credited Mordecai with writing it.3But there is little other support for Ezra or Mordecai's authorship of this book. Third, Malachi appears in 3:1 as an anonymous designation meaning "my messenger,"so it may mean the same thing in 1:1. However, the Malachi in 3:1 seems clearly to be a wordplay on the name of the prophet in 1:1. Fourth, this book was the third of three oracles (Heb. massa', 1:1) the other two being in Zechariah 9-11 and 12-14 (cf. Zech. 9:1; 11:1). Yet Malachi introduced his oracle differently from the way Zechariah introduced his.4Furthermore, other prophets introduced their books by calling them oracles (cf. Nah. 1:1; Hab. 1:1).
If Malachi is not the prophet's name, this would be the only prophetical book in the Old Testament that is anonymous, which seems very unlikely.
