Christine Hayes, professor at Yale, examines how Israel's prophets reinterpreted the destruction of Jerusalem as a religious crisis rather than a refutation of faith. This lecture from Yale's Introduction to the Old Testament course focuses mainly on Ezekiel, tracing the structure and tone of his book, his violent denunciations of Jerusalem, and his rejection of collective punishment in favor of individual responsibility. Hayes discusses Ezekiel's visions of God withdrawing from the Temple to join the exiles and his eventual promised return, along with the prophet's use of dramatic symbolic acts. The lecture closes with Second Isaiah, covering its major themes and the famous servant songs, which Hayes reads as giving Israel's suffering a universal meaning. Throughout, she highlights contradictions and tensions within the biblical text itself as prophets wrestle with theodicy after national catastrophe.