Prophecy

For our Sunday evening adult Bible Study I’ve been taking questions and doing my best to provide – if not answers, at least insight. One question concerned whether ‘prophecy’ is still a function of modern Christianity and if so, what does it look like. My methodology always begins with a linguistic definition of the term. We all carry ideas of what words mean but we often find, upon examination, that our ideas are a little hazy. It is crucial for us to understand what Biblical prophecy is and isn’t before we start to include or exclude any prospective modern examples. But very few tasks are as simple as we’d like them to be. We have to look at the various words from the languages of the Bible (especially the Old Testament) which we translate as ‘prophet’ and decide whether all those words are really talking about the same thing. If our English translations have conflated different ideas into a single term, the difficulty of our task multiplies exponentially. Accordingly, in this vocabulary study I will examine only such terms as are applied to several different individuals we would recognize as ‘prophets’. 

1. Of these, the most commonly used OT term is ‘Chazeh’. As a noun (prophet) it means ‘seer’ and as a verb (prophesy) it means ‘to see’. This is the aspect of prophecy most associated with ‘predicting the future’ but it is not specifically limited to that. The prophet may also ‘see’ clearly the will of God for the present. In fact, prophetic predictions were generally related to the present behavior of the prophet’s audience. ‘Change your ways now or, a day is coming when…’ Certainly, this summarizes the purpose of many of the predictions made by Isaiah, Amos, Jonah, etc. Zechariah and Haggai looked far into the future and while there may have been many long-term implications to their visions (note the relationship of the concept of ‘vision’ to the term ‘seer/to see’) the immediate import was to encourage the returning refugees to rebuild the temple in the present. As Jeremiah’s initial predictions of the coming Babylonian captivity had the immediate hope of changing the people’s behavior before it was too late – so his predictions about the 70 year limit of the captivity and the subsequent opportunity to return to the land of promise and try again – had the effect of helping the captive Israelites hang on – right now. Ultimately, whether related to future predictions or present behavior, the essence of the prophetic ministry was ‘to see’ clearly the will and plan of God’ and communicate that ‘vision’ to those who can or will not see.
2. The second most commonly used OT term is ‘Naba’. The root meaning is ‘to flow forth’. The idea is that the prophet is given a message the internal pressure of which is so great that it MUST be communicated (flow forth). Again, this term is applied to several of the classical prophets but perhaps a clearer example for us is found in what happened to Saul in I Samuel 10. Saul did not set out to be a prophet and had a completely different agenda at the moment. But God forced the spirit of prophecy upon Israel’s first king as a matter of humbling him. Whether Saul would or not – he did join the band of prophets and prophesied. God placed the message in him which MUST be delivered – must flow forth. In Ezra, Nehemiah and Daniel a different formulation of the same term (Nebi) is used as a more technical description of ‘prophet’ as an office. But the root meaning remains the same – to flow forth.
3. ‘Massan’ describes ‘that which is lifted up’ and is generally translated as ‘a burden’ Thus the ‘burden of the prophecy of Agur or Lemuel’ from Proverbs 30:1 and 31:1. This phrase is used less often but is still applied widely enough to those we would recognize as prophets. The idea is that the spirit or message of prophecy is a weighty thing the prophet must carry. If you consider the careers of the prophets, this will seem obvious. There are other OT terms that could be examined but their usage is less general and the value of what they may add seems (to me) not worth the above-mentioned risk of conflation.
4. In the NT the vocabulary is, on the one hand, less daunting as it all revolves around a single term – ‘prophetes’. On the other hand, the secular use of the term means little more than ‘one who offers a public discourse.’ It is something of an open question how much of the OT ideas attach to the word ‘prophetes’ when it is taken from the secular realm and becomes a staple of Scripture. For the present purpose, as the NT uses the word in relationship to all those (Isaiah, Jonah, et al) covered by the OT words, I will presume it all carries over and also that it all attaches to those who inherit the mantle in the NT age (Phillip’s daughters, Agabus, etc.)

I will add a tid-bit from the teaching of Paul, I Corinthians 14:22, ‘prophecy’ is for the sake of those who already believe – other exercises are more appropriate to an audience of unbelievers.
What would prophecy look like today?
*A public as opposed to private exercise
*An exercise for the sake of those who already believe rather than a more evangelistic enterprise
​*A heavy or weighty ministry – carried as something of a burden
*A message/ministry planted by God inside the prophet and possessed of sufficient internal pressure that it must be delivered (flow forth)
*A ministry by one who has been given to see a clear vision (of the future or of the present situation) and must communicate that vision to those who cannot or will not see.
 
Note: this is the beginning, not the end of a methodology for defining and recognizing prophecy. But – the better we can define what we’re looking for, the more likely we are to recognize it when we see it and the less likely we are to be fooled by counterfeits. I may return to this topic in a future blog. In the meantime, I will add only one question and one statement.
Question: What would be the differences between ‘prophecy’ and ‘preaching’?
Statement: If an alleged prophet makes a prediction – it had better come true and there is no batting 500. Harold Camping is out.