The word tannur is used figuratively in the Old Testament to indicate divine
judgment and human passions. Malachi uses the oven as an image of consuming
vengeance (Reventlow, Die Propheten,
157.159):” ‘For look! The day is about to come, burning like an oven [tannur], and all the arrogant and every
evildoer will be stubble. The coming day will consume them,’ says Yahweh of
hosts” (Mal 4:1). The book of Psalms records similar usage: “You will make them
like your fiery furnace [tannur] at
the time of your appearance. Yahweh will swallow them in his wrath and fire
will consume them” (Psa 21:9). The prophet Hosea describes the people of the
northern kingdom of Israel as adulterers, “like a burning oven [tannur] whose baker has stopped from
stirring the fire” (Hos 7:4). The metaphor seems to describe human passions
that burn on their own, inflaming hearts and consuming rulers (see also Hos
7:6–7). (Dempsey Rosales Asosta, “Tannur,” in The Lexham Bible Dictionary,
ed. John D. Barry et al. [Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Press, 2016], Logos Bible
Software edition)
Malachi appeals to the metaphor
of a furnace in his forecast of a coming day when God will destroy the arrogant
and the wicked (Mal 4:1 [mt 3:19]). The “furnace” (Heb tannûr) refers to a fixed or portable beehive shaped earthenware
oven or stove used especially for baking bread. For the prophet, it becomes a
frightening symbol of divine judgment likening the Day of the Lord to an oven
that incinerates those who oppose God (cf. Ps 21:9 [mt 21:10]). (A. E.
Hill, “Malachi, Book of,” in Dictionary of the Old Testament: Prophets,
ed. Mark J. Boda and Gordon J. McConville [Downers Grove, Ill. IVP Academic,
2012], 532)
