(c) Our conception of prophecy is a moral converse with God and an enlightenment of the people. These, however, are relative terms, and insofar as divination sought the same object it is related to prophecy.1

(d) The prophets were originally seers, and the seers were orignally nothing more than diviners, and so the prophets and diviners started from the same point.2

(e) If, through observation of signs and times, the diviner, by his own reasoning powers, sees God's intentions (Brinton, p. III), so did the prophets, in a higher sense, often see God's intention and moral government by observation of historical events and actions.

(f) If the prophets were certain of announcing the "Word of God," so also were the diviners of all nations, especially when in ecstatic, cataleptic and other pathological states of the mind.

3

(g) If the diviners thought they were able to ward off danger by their magic and power divine, so also did the prophets of all ages and times by means of righteousness and obedience to the will of God.

(h) If the prophets were considered and looked up to as the counsellors and leaders in matters of religion and the state, so were many of the diviners held in the same high esteem among all nations.*

Hence, again, in these related points, the psychology of the prophet is in no wise different from the psychology of the diviner and might also be eliminated in our investigation of the distinctive features of the psychology of prophecy.

1 Cf. Oehler, p. 486.

2 Cf. Smend, p. 154.

3 Cf. Jastrow, M.: "Religion of Babylonia and Assyria," pp. 269 ff., also Julian Morgenstern: "The Doctrine of Sin in the Babylonian Religion," pp. 73 ff.

Cf. Knobel, p. 23.

Carlyle is right when he says: See deep enough, and you see musically.1 It is a well known fact that "the natural expression of religious emotion is universally metrical ";2 deep religious feeling always expresses itself in poetry and song.

The Romans called their poets vates, and Horace says they are non sine dis.3 Among the Greeks they were priests of Apollo, who was the inspirer of poet and prophet alike. Socrates points out the relation in the following way:*

"I soon discovered this, therefore, with regard to the poets, that they do not effect their object by wisdom, but by a certain natural inspiration, and under the influence of enthusiasm, like prophets and seers."

The poets and prophets alike were the chosen instruments of God, carried away, as by some mighty force, to announce the deep things in human life. The poets, too, have been far-sighted and prophetic, marching in the vanguard of humanity, feeling with the certainty of inner illumination that their thoughts and their messages were immortal like those of the prophets. Both were stimulated and strengthened by the ever present thought that they worked for the good and the right.

In the psychology of the poet, then, shall we find to a very large extent the psychology of the prophet. Not only in the depth of feeling and the breadth of vision, but in form, style and diction are the prophets true poets.5 Wherever feeling is deep and rich, wherever enthusiasm

1"Heroes and Hero-Worship," Lect. III.

2 Brinton: "Religions of Primitive Peoples," p. 239.

3 Schwartzkopff: "Die Prophetische Offenbarung,” Giessen, 1896, p. 86 ff. * Apology to Athenians, quoted by Hudson in the "Law of Psychic Phenomena."

5

are used in both senses, especially in the sense of התנבא and נבא*

singing and playing. Cf. I Chr. 25: 1 and 3.

is strong and overpowering, wherever patriotism is supreme and religious emotion at its highest and purest, there the faculties of the soul struggle mightily within to aid the tumultuous stream of thought, and the sweep is sublime. The mountains and the seas, the hills and valleys, the forests and rivers, the flowers, the plants, the animals, all things in heaven and earth are suddenly wakened into life to stimulate imagination, fancy and thought, and when the heart and mind are thus wedded for a holy cause, expression assumes of itself the manycolored garb of most impassioned, sonorous and richest poetry. "Die Idealitaet der Ziele, die Ergriffenheit des Gefuehls und die Anschaulichkeit der Form charakterisieren aber noch mehr den Dichter als den Redner. So wird demnach wiederum die religioese Begeisterung des Propheten die Gesamtform seines Vorstellens und Darstellens im dichterischen Sinne beeinflussen."1 And again:2 "Auch durch diese Tiefe des idealen Hintergrundes allgemein wertvoller Gedanken wird der Prophet, zumal in seinen Weissagungen, mehr die Art des Dichters, als des Redners an sich tragen.' The very conception "The Word of God" which the prophets so often make use of, thinks Schwartzkopff (p. 96), is a metaphor, the child of the intense religio-ethical feeling, the highest and boldest poetic expression. The Hebrew prophets are so closely related to poets that their compositions are filled with poetic productions of every variety, poetic in thought, in expression, in form, in diction, among which are some belonging to the best of which universal literature can boast.

This subject has been treated fully by Knobel in his book published in 1837, and more recently by Richard G.

1

Schwartzkopff: "Die Prophetische Offenbarung," p. 93.

2 Ib., p. 94.

Moulton, of the Chicago University.1

Here it is pos

sible only to give the barest outline of their works.

These prophets were men whose feeling and imagination were stimulated to the highest pitch.2 In their writings, therefore, they employ word-pictures, apostrophes, prosopopeias and theophanies. For the lively description of their thoughts they make use of similes, metaphors, allegories, also symbolic and parabolic treatment. Rhythm, parallelism and strophe, parenomasia, poetic diction and all forms of prosody were woven into the prophetic works.

Isaiah, Joel, Nahum, Habakkuk, in a less degree Jeremiah and Ezekiel, are masters of picturesque description. Events of especial interest they picture so vividly and lifelike that the reader sees these events transpiring before his eyes. A few examples of highly poetic description follow: How Assyria enters the Holy Land (Is. 10: 28); How they attack Jerusalem (Is. 22: 1 ff.); The fall of Nineveh (Nahum Chaps. 2 and 3). Cf. also Is. 21: 1 ff.; 15:

16; 44: 12-17; Joel 2: 2 ff.; Ezek. 27; Jer. 46. The prophets often introduce speakers as in dramatic poetry. Examples: Is. 10: 8; 19: 11; 37: 24; Ezek. 28:

2; 29: 3, 9.

Often they address the heavens, the earth, the mountains, trees, plants, even Jahve himself is often introduced on the scene, all of which is, of course, highly poetic and shows a lively imaginative activity. Micah 6: 1-8 represents God's controversy before the mountains; Hosea 9-14 dramatizes the Yearning of God; and Jeremiah 10: 17-25 is a dramatic scene of Panic and is a link between this type and rhapsody. Especially rich are the

1

1 Valuable suggestions may be found in Schwartzkopff, ib., pp. 86-100; cf. also Driver's "Isaiah," pp. 168 ff.

2 Based on Knobel, Part IV, and Moulton: "Literary Study of the Bible," Book Sixth.

prophetic writings in similes, metaphors, parables, allegories, the last especially by Ezekiel.

The Doom-Song is especially numerous, of which the following examples will give an idea of the variety and beauty: Against Nineveh, Nahum; against Assyria, Isaiah 14: 24-27; against Babylon, Isaiah 13-14: 23; also Jeremiah 50-51; against Egypt, Isaiah 19; Jeremiah 46: 3-12 and verses 14-28; Ezekiel 29-32; against Edom, Jeremiah 49: 7-22; Ezekiel 25: 12-24; Obadiah; a whole cycle of Dooms especially beautiful and rhythmic is Amos, 1 and 2.1

In Chapter XVIII of Moulton's Literary Study of the Bible is presented a highly interesting account of The Rhapsody in Prophetic Literature. This species of poetry is perhaps the highest form of poetic art, and the prophets certainly show themselves masters of this art. Speaking of Habakkuk's short book, Moulton calls it the simplest example of The Rhapsody, and yet characterizes the third part as follows:

The third section of this rhapsody is the most magnificent of Biblical odes: the promised intervention of Deity is no longer contemplated as a future event, but is realized as immediately present. After a prelude of trembling anxiety—

"O Lord, I have heard the report of thee, and am afraid:

O Lord, revive thy work in the midst of the years,

In the midst of the years make it known;

In wrath remember mercy!".

the Vision bursts upon the prophet. Its antistrophic form is an exact reflex of the thought. The strophe presents all nature convulsed with the approach of Deity.

1

"God cometh from Teman,

And the Holy One from Mount Paran,

His glory covereth the heavens,

1 See Moulton, ib., p. 522, for complete list of Doom-Songs.