The
Phenomenon of Prophecy
A
prophet is a messenger of God, a person to whom God entrusts his
message to an individual or to a nation. Indeed, the last book in the
OT is named “Malachi,” which means “my messenger.”
Isaiah heard God ask, “Whom shall I send?” and he cried
out, “Send me!” (Isa. 6:8). A good template for
understanding the phenomenon is Moses and Aaron. Moses was to tell
Aaron what to say, and Aaron would say it. “Then the Lord said
to Moses, ‘See, I have made you like God to Pharaoh, and your
brother Aaron will be your prophet’ ” (Exod. 7:1).
Prophets
such as Isaiah were privy to what transpires in heaven, where
decisions were being made that control the course of human history.
Micaiah describes how he has seen God in the company of the heavenly
host deliberating on how to entice Ahab to his death (1 Kings
22:13–23). All the other “prophets” in Ahab’s
court were false, since they did not have knowledge of the events
beyond human ken, as only true prophets can. Only one who has
encountered God in this way can speak as an agent of the heavenly
court.
For
every true prophet in Israel, there were many false prophets. Moses
set guidelines for distinguishing them. True prophets prophesy in
accordance with revealed religion. If a prophet contradicts the law,
for example, and calls Israel to worship another god, this is not a
true prophet (Deut. 18:20). Also, if a prophet predicts something
that does not come to pass, that is also a false prophet (Deut.
18:21–22). These criteria are not mechanical and automatic,
however. Sometimes a prophet may appear to contradict prior
revelation (Jer. 26:11), and sometimes the predicted judgment is
staved off by national repentance (Jon. 4). Also, sometimes God may
test the people with a false prophet who makes a true prediction
(Deut. 13:1–3).
True
prophets occasionally exhibited bizarre behavior. Saul, while
pursuing David, was suddenly possessed by the Spirit of God and lay
naked day and night, prophesying. This caused the people to ask if
Saul was now one of the prophets (1 Sam. 19:24). Even in the
ancient world, prophets were considered a bit crazy (2 Kings
9:11; Jer. 23:9; 29:26; Hos. 9:7). The phenomenon he experienced is
referred to as “ecstasy.” The practice of tongues in the
NT church also seems to have been ecstatic behavior. Paul notes that
observers would call practitioners “out of your mind”
(1 Cor. 14:23). At Pentecost, some observers thought that the
apostles were drunk. Peter replied that they were not drunk but
rather had the Spirit upon them (Acts 2:15–21).
The
word “prophet” refers to one who foretells the future. Of
course, many people cannot accept the notion of real prophecy and
thus regard all prophecy as an illusion. Either the text was written
after the fact, or it was couched in such general terms that it is no
miracle that it came true, or else it was a lucky guess. The text
itself, however, wants to be read as real prophecy, and Christians
before the modern age read it as such. After all, to reject the
supernatural elements in the Bible ultimately leads to rejecting the
resurrection of Christ.
However,
the modern Christian should not focus on the predictive part of the
prophets’ message to such an extent that the “forthtelling”
element is neglected. Forthtelling is the prophets’ chief
ministry—calling the people to mercy and justice, to obedience
to the law and fidelity to God. Christians who believe the Bible
should take seriously the predictions about the future, but even more
so the challenges about the present.
The
Books of Prophecy in the Old Testament
The
OT of Catholic and Protestant Bibles is roughly organized around the
Greek translation of the OT, the Septuagint. Thus, Daniel is
considered a prophetic book, and the prophets are separated from the
historical books by the poetical books. However, the Hebrew Bible has
a different organization. It has only eight “books” of
prophecy, divided into the Former Prophets and the Latter Prophets.
The Former Prophets are Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings.
Traditionally, Samuel wrote Judges. The books of 1 Samuel and
2 Samuel form one scroll, as do 1 Kings and 2 Kings.
The book of Samuel bears the name of the prophet, and Kings is
substantially about Elijah and Elisha. The four Former Prophets
witness to the outworking of the covenant sanctions, from the
Israelites’ entry into the promised land to their expulsion
from it.
Usually,
when Christians speak of the prophets, they are referring to the
Latter Prophets, plus Daniel. In Catholic and Protestant Bibles there
are four Major Prophets: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel; and
twelve Minor Prophets: Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah,
Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Many
other prophets ministered in Israel but have no scroll that bears
their name. Thus, the ones listed above can be called the “writing
prophets.”
Isaiah.
The book of Isaiah preserves the sermons from the prophet who
ministered during the time when Hezekiah was king of Judah, the
southern kingdom. Isaiah saw Jerusalem surrounded by the Assyrian
army and assured the king that God would deliver his people. That
message of salvation is the overall theme of the book, a salvation
universal in scope and focused on the figure of the Suffering
Servant. Isaiah claims that this servant of God would be wounded and
“cut off from the land of the living” (Isa. 53:8) and
through this would bring healing and salvation to his people. He
would see this and make many righteous (Isa. 53).
The
NT refers to Isaiah more often than any other prophet, always to
demonstrate that the truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ were
revealed in advance by the prophet. For example, Paul cites Isa. 1:9
in his argument as to why the Jews had rejected the gospel (Rom.
9:29). When Jesus withdrew to the area of Zebulun and Naphtali,
Matthew says that this act fulfilled Isa. 9:1–2 (Matt.
4:15–16). Jesus himself cites Isa. 53:12, “[he] was
numbered with the transgressors,” and claims that it was
written about him (Luke 22:37). He does the same with Isa. 61:1–2
(Luke 4:18–21).
Jeremiah.
The book of Jeremiah puts in writing the words of the prophet
Jeremiah, who ministered at the very end of the kingdom of Judah and
lived through the destruction of Jerusalem, with its temple and the
people of God being taken away to forced exile and captivity. He sees
the weakness and powerlessness of the covenant that God had made with
his people to stir up love and fidelity in their hearts to him.
According to Jeremiah, what the people chiefly need is a new covenant
altogether, one that is not external and written on tablets of stone,
but internal, written on their hearts. They need a change of
personality to become a different sort of people altogether. This is
what Jeremiah predicts will happen in the coming age after their time
of captivity is over (Jer. 31:31–40). The NT identifies this
new covenant with the gospel of Jesus (Heb. 8:8–12), secured by
his blood (Heb. 10:16–17). This is the new covenant that Jesus
announces to his disciples when he eats the Last Supper with them
(Luke 22:20).
Ezekiel.
The book of Ezekiel picks up where Jeremiah leaves off and continues
from the destruction of Jerusalem into the early years of the
Babylonian captivity. Like Jeremiah, Ezekiel sees the failure of the
old covenant. He likens Israel to a married woman who violates her
marriage covenant at every turn (Ezek. 16). The prophet also foresees
a future character transformation of God’s people. “I
will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove
from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I
will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be
careful to keep my laws” (Ezek. 36:26–27). This is
graphically illustrated in Ezek. 37, where the prophet is told to
prophesy to a valley of dry bones, and through the preaching of the
word of God the company of the dead come to life and become a vast
army—not of skeletons, but of vitally alive warriors. This is a
vision of what will happen when God makes an everlasting covenant
with them and will dwell with them forever (Ezek. 37:26–27).
Paul cites this in 2 Cor. 6:16 and argues, “We are the
temple of the living God.” The last part of Ezekiel describes a
great, larger-than-life temple that Paul interprets to be the church.
Thus, Ezekiel anticipates the preaching of the gospel, bringing
spiritual life to a vast company of believers, among whom God himself
will dwell.
Daniel.
The book of Daniel is not a prophetic book by genre, but much of it
is devoted to predicting the future, so in Catholic and Protestant
Bibles it is placed between Ezekiel and the Minor Prophets. Prophecy
calls the people to repentance and threatens judgment on them due to
their sin. Daniel does the opposite: it calls them to persevere as
saints, while the evil nations oppress them, until the end of time,
when they will be vindicated. Daniel comforts the faithful who are
suffering due to the sins of the nations.
The
Twelve.
The twelve Minor Prophets follow a roughly chronological sequence
(with some notable exceptions). Hosea, Amos, and Micah date from the
rise of Assyria as the great power that threatened Israel and Judah.
Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah date from near the end of Assyrian
dominance and the rise of Babylon. The Babylonian exile is skipped,
and the last three—Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi—were
written after the Jews’ restoration to the land of Judah. Joel,
Obadiah, and Jonah are difficult to date with certainty.
Read
as one book, the Minor Prophets tell a story of God’s constancy
and fidelity even though everything else in the world changes. They
begin with all twelve tribes intact and enjoying prosperity in the
land. In Judah, there is a king on the throne of David. But by the
end, most of the tribes are lost, the monarchy is no more, Jerusalem
and the temple have been destroyed, and the Jews are under the heel
of foreign powers. After all of that, God says to them, almost as the
moral of the whole history of the OT, “I the Lord do not
change. So you, the descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed. Ever
since the time of your ancestors you have turned away from my decrees
and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you”
(Mal. 3:6–7). Deeply explored in the Minor Prophets is the day
of the Lord, the climax and denouement of history, in which all the
words of the prophets will finally be fulfilled (see Joel and
Zephaniah). The reader is given, as a picture of this day, a view of
the repentance of one generation of Ninevites at the preaching of
Jonah and of the final judgment to fall on that city as described by
Nahum.
The
NT cites the Minor Prophets much more often than any book of prophecy
except Isaiah. Peter draws upon Joel 2:28–32 to explain the
pouring out of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:17–21).
James cites Amos 9:11–12 to demonstrate that salvation was
always intended for the Gentiles as well as the Jews (Acts 15:16–17).
Paul quotes Hab. 2:4 to argue that righteousness before God comes
through faith (Rom. 1:17; Gal. 3:11). Jesus says that like Jonah, he
will return to the land of the living after three days (Matt.
12:38–41).
Prophecy
in the New Testament
In
the NT period there were a number of prophets. John the Baptist could
point to Jesus and proclaim him to be the Lamb of God, who takes away
the sins of the world (John 1:29). Agabus the prophet predicted a
famine and, later, Paul’s arrest (Acts 11:28; 21:10–11).
Paul
lists “gifts of the Spirit” (1 Cor. 12:4–11),
including prophecy and various phenomena reminiscent of the OT
prophets’ ecstatic state. Paul warns the Corinthians not to
overdo this sort of thing and so to be mature (1 Cor. 14:19–20).
Near the end of his life, in one of his last letters, he speaks of
prophecy as normative in the church, particularly in establishing an
authoritative body of elders to rule and especially to preach the
gospel (1 Tim. 1:18; 4:14). Peter draws a connection between the
ministry of the OT prophets and the proclamation of the gospel of
Jesus Christ (1 Pet. 1:10–12). Evangelism seems to be the
normative mode for prophecy today: forthtelling by calling people to
turn from their sins to Jesus, and foretelling by speaking of his
return and the final judgment.
Thus,
all Christians hold the office of prophet, even if they never
participate in the ecstatic state experienced by the Corinthians. The
greatness of a prophet is in how clearly the prophet points to Jesus.
John the Baptist was the greatest of the OT prophets by that measure,
but any Christian on this side of the cross and resurrection can
proclaim the gospel even more clearly. Thus, the prophetic ministry
of any Christian is greater than John’s (Matt. 11:11).
