PROPHECY (OF. prophecie, prophetie, Fr. prophétie, from Lat. prophetia, from Gk. προφητεία, prophēteia, prediction, from προφητεύειν, prophēteuein, to predict, from προφήτης, prophētēs, prophet, from προφάναι, prophanai, to say before, from πρό, pro, before + φάναι, phanai, to say). According to the popular acceptation, prophecy is essentially prediction, a foretelling of events by divinely inspired personages. Inasmuch however as the general ideas on the subject are based upon religious phenomena in Hebrew history, it is but proper, in order to determine the exact force of the term and its development, to turn to Hebrew usage. Adopting this method we find the earlier terms in Hebrew for prophet (e.g. rō'eh, ‘seer,’ khōzeh, ‘one who has a vision’) associated with the prognostication of the future, and there is no reason to differentiate Hebrew prophecy in this stage from the belief common to all peoples in a low state of culture assigns to certain individuals the power of ascertaining the will of the gods in whose hands the future of an individual or of a community lies. Such beliefs were common among Semites closely affiliated with the Hebrews. In Babylonia we find soothsayers, sorcerers, witches, and magicians recognized as necessary elements of society, and various classes of omen-priests connected with the Babylonian temples: kāhin, the Arabic equivalent of the Hebrew word for priest (kōhēn), is used to designate the ‘soothsayer.’ The various classes of soothsayers enumerated in Deut. xviii. 9-14 show not only the prevalence of this belief among the Hebrews up to a comparatively late period, but also the power which the soothsayers continued to exercise even after the period when the Hebrews entered upon a line of religious development destined to mark them off sharply from their fellow Semites.
The Hebrew ‘prophet’ accordingly traces his
origin back to the ‘seer,’ that is, to the magician, sorcerer, and soothsayer; if he stands out in history as a personage distinct from the ‘seer,’ it is because there is afterwards added in his case a quality of a higher order. It is not difficult to determine what this quality is. In the proper historical sense, the term ‘prophet’ is applicable only to the series of teachers and exhorters who arose among the Hebrews in the eighth century , and through whose influence a new conception of Deity and of the relation of the national god Yahweh to his people was evolved. While also concerned with ‘prophecy’ in the sense of foretelling the future, they dealt not with individuals, but with the nation as a whole or with the two sections of the people — the northern Kingdom of Israel, and the southern Kingdom of Judah. More than this, the prophetic functions which they exercised, or claimed to exercise, were incidental to their main task, which was to impress upon the people the sense of responsibility for their acts to a Deity, who governed, not by caprice, but by high standards of right, purity, and Justice, and who was
to be approached, not by gifts and
sacrifices, but by a contrite heart and a genuine spirit
of devotion. The prognostications indulged in
by those prophets of whose utterances we
possess fragments in the ‘prophetical’ division of the
Old Testament are largely concerned with threats
of divine punishment for disobedience to
Yahweh's will and decrees. They are accordingly
based upon the profound conviction of the
prophet that wrong-doing is certain to be
punished; and in this respect their prophecies differ
essentially from the attempts of soothsayers and
diviners to determine by means of omens and
oracular devices the course that will be taken by
events and to ascertain the will of the gods.
