PROPHECY. The appeal to prophecy. V. RENEWED CONVERSATION. PUNDIT. We have still to consider the miracles connected with the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus. STUDENT. The history of Jesus is so mixed up with questions of prophecy, as well as of miracle, that perhaps it would be well to reserve entering thereon directly till we have first dealt with the subject of prophecy, so far as to see whether any testimony to the divine authorship of the Bible can be claimed from that source. P.-Very well. Be pleased to explain to me what sort of reliance is placed upon prophetic utterances as proving the action of God. S.-The power to discern and declare future events is as much beyond the capacity of mere men as that of working miracles. It has consequently been openly appealed to as affording a test whereby to distinguish the true from false gods. Produce your cause, saith the Lord; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the king of Jacob. Let them bring them forth, and show us what shall happen: let them show the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods" (Isa. xli. 21-23). Search the scriptures," said Jesus, "for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me" (John v. 39); and in the accounts of his life the appeal to the events thereof, as being in fulfilment of prophecies, is constantly made. And this description of testimony is held up as more striking, and convincing, than even the plainest ocular demonstrations. "They have Moses and the prophets," Jesus said, "let them come. hear them. If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead" (Luke xvi. 29-31). Peter and two other disciples had been vouchsafed a special manifestation of Jesus in a glorified state, attended by Moses and Elias. Peter adverts to this when he says, "We have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eye-witnesses of his majesty." But he presents prophecy as a superior source of satisfaction, adding, “We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" (2 Pet. i. 16-21). phets. P. Of course, as in the case of working miracles, there False pro has been a liability to deceivers coming forward with pretended prophecies ? S. There has been abundant opening for such deception in the remote times of the Bible, when manifestations of the sort were habitually looked for and trusted in. "Then the Lord said unto me," declares Jeremiah, "the prophets prophesy lies in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, neither spake unto them: they prophesy unto you a false vision and divination, and a thing of nought, and the deceit of their heart" (Jer. xiv. 14). "I have not sent these prophets, yet they ran: I have not spoken to them, yet they prophesied." "I have not sent them, saith the Lord, yet they prophesy a lie in my name" (Jer. xxiii. 21; xxvii. 15). P.-How were the people to distinguish between a true Test of and a false prophet? S.-The rule is thus laid down. "The prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the Lord hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath true pro phets. Indistinct phecy. spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him" (Deut. xviii. 20-22). P. This rule contemplates only utterances such as were to be fulfilled promptly, within the life-time of the prophet giving them forth. Were there none which related to events of remote accomplishment? S. There is room to infer that the prophets treated commonly of what they conceived would shortly be brought to pass, but results have shown that, if their statements are to stand, they must be referred, in most instances, to a distant future. That this was not contemplated when the test to be applied to prophecy was laid down, is apparent. P. If the event is to govern the acceptance of the prophecy, then, until the event occurs, however distant the day, no one can say whether the prophecy is to be depended on, and heeded, or not. Under such circumstances, I cannot conceive what can be the utility of prophecy. The event, which controls all, would in due time declare itself and prevail, whether the prophecy were uttered or not. S. So it might be thought. Still, as you will observe, we are enjoined to "take heed" unto prophecy, "as unto a light that shineth in a dark place." P. This exhortation certainly does not consist with the rule making the integrity of a prophecy to depend upon its realization. However, I presume that this light which is to illuminate us in our natural darkness, at all events shines so clearly as to indicate, without room for mistake, the objects on which it casts its radiance. S-On the contrary, nothing is more difficult than the ness of pro- application of prophecy to the events foretold. In the first place, there are serious differences as to whether prophecies have been, or remain to be, accomplished. The Jews, for example, deny the fulfilment of those predictions of the Messiah which the Christians believe to have been brought to pass in the person and career of Jesus. And over the whole range of the Apocalypse, and the analogous prophecies in Daniel, the Christians are at great issue among themselves in deciding whether fulfilments have taken place or not. In respect of these prophecies, whether those cited in the histories of Jesus, or those in the Apocalypse, it is only by considerable straining of the language, and accommodation, that seeming fulfilments are made out; and in regard to the adaptation of events to the Apocalypse, the differences, in selecting the events and making the applications thereto, are nearly as numerous as the interpreters. P.—What is this owing to? Surely the language of the The prophetic prophet should be sufficiently clear to make it apparent at style. once whether any given event is, or is not, what he pointed to. S.-One would have thought so, especially in view of the test by which the prophecy was to be judged of. Besides the difficulties inherent to the comprehension of extinct languages, the phraseology of the prophecies is more than ordinarily involved. The prophets appear to have considered themselves privileged to deal in obscurities. "The words of the wise," it was thought, were presented with most effect in "dark sayings" (Prov. i. 6). The prophets are apt to pass from subject to subject without connection, mixing things present with those that are to come, using figurative designations, or actual symbols, changing persons and tenses in an unrestrained manner, and but dimly shadowing forth the objects indicated. With such a foundation to work upon, and where unchallengeable precision is not to be expected, the ingenuity of interpreters has enabled them to adapt the prophecies to any facts they may be pleased to marshal as embraced by them. P.-Who were the prophets, and under what circumstances did they make their annunciations? S.-The prophets were a numerous body, and went together in bands, or companies. Samuel told Saul that he should meet "a company of prophets," who should prophecy; and after joining them, "the Spirit of God came upon him, and he prophesied among them," so that the saying went forth, "Is Saul also among the prophets?" (1 Sam. x. 5-12). When Jezebel was destroying the prophets, Obadiah hid a hundred of them in caves (1 Kings xviii. 4). Four hundred were consulted by the kings of Judah and Israel in respect of their expedition to Ramoth-Gilead (1 Kings xxii. 6). Fifty men, "sons of the prophets," accompanied Elijah and Elisha when the former was translated to heaven (2 Kings ii. 7). "Would God," said Moses, "that all the Lord's people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his Spirit upon them" The prophets as a body. Prophets excited by music. (Num. xi. 29). They were ordinarily under the guidance of The prophets operated under the excitation of music and song. "I will open," said the Psalmist, "my dark saying upon the harp" (Ps. xlix. 4). Miriam, the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand, and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances," and then we have her utterance (Ex. xv. 20, 21). The company that Saul was sent to meet were to be seen 'coming down from the high place with a psaltery, and a tabret, and a pipe, and a harp, before them." David, whose prophesyings are given in the Psalms, was an accomplished musician, and encouraged the art. When the ark was brought back from the land of the Philistines, he "and all Israel played before God with all their might, and with singing, and with harps, and with psalteries, and with timbrels, and with cymbals, and with trumpets" (1 Chron. xiii. 8; see also xv. 28; xvi. 42). These performances were instituted by the prophets, the injunctions "of David, and of Gad the king's seer, and Nathan the prophet," being cited for them (2 Chron. xxix. 25). "Moreover, David and the captains of the host separated to the service of the sons of Asaph and of Heman, and of Jeduthan, who should prophesy with harps, with psalteries, and with cymbals" (1 Chron. xxv. 1-3). And when Elisha was called upon to see from whence help could come when the armies of Judah, Israel, and Edom were in peril from drought, he said, "Now bring me a minstrel. And it came to pass, when the minstrel played, that the hand of the Lord came upon him," and he predicted the coming supply, as also the overthrow of the Moabites, against whom the expedition had been formed (2 Kings iii. 11-19). |