CHAPTER II

POPULAR CONCEPTIONS OF HEBREW PROPHETS

THE purpose of this chapter and the following is not polemic; its object is to prepare the mind for an unbiased study of the subject of prophecy. Only when the brushwood has been cleared will it be possible to begin the study of this subject in the same unimpassioned, scientific way as one studies the psychology of feeling and thought in general, or the psychology of the musician or the carpenter in particular. This clearing of the ground is not an easy task, because most people cannot think properly on this subject; they feel too strongly their religious systems bound up with the interpretation of prophecy, and so the ideas held by otherwise great scholars are not reasoned judgments but feeling judgments. When a man prefaces his book1 with a confession like the following, it is evident that his remarks on prophecy have no value whatever for the student of the psychology of prophecy, however valuable they might be to the theologian: "With the best will in the world to accept whatever new light criticism may have to throw on the structure and meaning of the Old Testament, he has to confess that his study of the critical developments—now for over thirty years—has increasingly convinced him that while Biblical students are indebted to the critics, and to Old Testament science generally, for valuable help, the Graf-Wellhausen hypothesis now in the ascendant is, neither in its methods nor in its results, entitled to the unqualified confidence often claimed for it. He is persuaded, on the contrary, that it rests on erroneous fundamental principles, is eaten through with 1Orr, James, D.D.: "The Problem of the Old Testament," 1906, p. xv.

subjectivity, and must, if carried out to its logical issuesto which happily very many do not carry it-prove subversive of our Christian faith, and of such belief in, and use of, the Bible as alone can meet the needs of the living church."1

It is evident that a study of psychology cannot well afford to question the needs of the church or to conform to the requirements of Christian faith, rather must all things conform to psychological facts, and so I grant the author of the above quotation to be perfectly honest in his confession, however unwise he may be in arguing for the validity of his thoughts.

Without any further explanation, therefore, I shall briefly show some of the most important popular views held concerning prophecy, and point out what is false and what is true in these views.

The Hebrew prophets were divinely inspired because they foretold the coming of the Messiah, and this Messiah is Jesus.

One might pick up almost any book on almost any subject pertaining to Old and New Testament study and this thought will be prominently written across the pages.

"To the Christian it is enough to show that the truth of the New Testament and the truthfulness of its authors, are bound up with the truth of the existence of this predictive element in the prophets."2

Briggs says: "Prediction is the most important section of Hebrew prophecy, simply because it presents the essential ideal of the completion of redemption through the Messiah."

"Thus prophecy holds in every event the coming of

1The italics are mine.

'Smith's Bible Dictionary, art. "The Prophetic Gift."

the Judge and Saviour of the world to set up his kingdom."1

Speaking of the 53d Chapter of Isaiah, James Orr2 says: "Dismissing for the moment all critical considerations as to age, authorship or original reference, let any one steep his mind in the contents of that chapter, then read what is said about Jesus in the Gospels, and, as he stands under the shadow of the cross, say if there is not the most complete correspondence between the two. In Jesus of Nazareth, alone in all history, but in him perfectly, has this prophecy found a fulfillment."

"The abiding value of the Old Testament lies above all in this" writes Dr. Kautzsch,3 "that it guarantees to us with absolute certainty the fact and the process of a divine plan and way of salvation, which found its conclusion and fulfilment in the new covenant, in the person and work of Jesus Christ."

The Bible contains in itself the fullest witness to its divine authority. If it appears that a large collection of fragmentary records written, with few exceptions, without any designed connection, at most distant times and under the most varied circumstances, yet combined to form a definite whole, broadly separated from others if in proportion as they are felt to be separated they are felt also to be instinct with a common spirit; then it will be readily acknowledged that however they were united afterwards into the sacred volume, they are yet legibly stamped with a divine seal as 'inspired of God in a sense in which no other writings are."4

Again Orr says in his closing chapter: "It is this connection of Old Testament with New, of Law with Gospel, 1Oehler: "Theology of the Old Testament," p. 489.

2 "The Problem of the Old Testament," p. 33.

Ib., p. 61.

*Westcott, "Bible in the Church," p. 14, as quoted by Orr, p. 50, note.

of prophecy with Christ, which gives the critical problems we have been studying their keenest interest. What mattered it about Abraham and Moses, so long as Jesus and His Gospel remains? That delusion is passing away. The fact is becoming apparent to the dullest, which has long been apparent to unbiased observers, that much of the radical criticism of the Old Testament proceeded on principles, and was conducted by methods, which had only to be applied with like thoroughness to the New Testament to work like havoc. The fundamental ideas of God and His revelation which underlay that criticism could not, as we set out by affirming, lead up to a doctrine of the Incarnation, but only to a negation of it."

There is no need to pile up quotations. What has been quoted shows beyond question, that the Christian religion as conceived by orthodox believers1 must have as its foundation a scheme in which prophets are divinely inspired, and a Book written by God or dictated by Him. Orr in one of the above quotations (from p. 33) indicates, indeed, the method by which he thinks the mind. must reach the conviction necessary for the basis of Christianity. He admits that Isaiah in his 53d chapter could not have referred to Jesus, but granting this, he maintains that Christianity2 as now upbuilt makes imperative a foretelling of Jesus' advent by the prophets, and so, relegating the claims of historicity to the rear, he matches the cogency of the reason with the confidence of faith, and, "standing in the shadow of the cross" he supports conviction with religious enthusiasm. Thus his feelingjudgment accepts what his reason-judgment rejects.

In fact a great part of the New Testament is written

1 Not all Christian writers think such a belief necessary for Christianity, but they are in the minority and not infrequently are tried as heretics. 2 Cf. Smend: "Lehrbuch der Alttest. Religionsgeschichte," p. 228, note 1, and pp. 373 ff.

by men whose conception of prophecy may be summed up by the phrase, "prediction of the Messiah." This prediction is the principal business of the prophets, and the Messiah, agreeing so well with the predictions, is proof conclusive of the divine inspiration of these prophets. The whole thing is very superficially done, as the oft repeated phrase and others of similar import show: certain things happened, transpired or were done in order "that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophets." In reality, however, people never do things and events do not transpire, in order that certain other things may be fulfilled.1

1 Very striking in this respect is the ignorance of Hebrew constructions displayed by the writer of the book of Matthew. Zachariah (9: 9) comforts Jerusalem with the hope that the future ideal King, evidently in contrast with the former wasteful splendor, will be meek, riding upon an ass (as contrasted with Solomon's horses), and uses the poetic expression made use of by every Hebrew poet, namely, that of repeating the thought

upon an ass, yea upon a * על חמור ועל עיר בן אתונות .in different words

...

colt, the foal of an ass." Even the Christian translation of the Bible (revised version, 1881-1885, New York, 1898) translates the verse correctly as follows: " riding upon an ass, even upon a colt, the foal of an ass." Matthew, or whoever wrote that book, not knowing very much about Hebrew syntactical constructions, takes that expression to mean two asses, and writes up the facts to agree with his ignorance, as follows: (Matt. 21: 1 ff.) "And when they drew nigh unto Jerusalem, and come unto Bethphage, unto the mount of Olives, then Jesus sent, saying unto them, Go into the village that is over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied, and a colt with her: loose them, and bring them unto me. And if any one say aught unto you, ye shall say, the Lord hath need of them; and straightway he will send them. Now this is come to pass that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophet saying:

"Tell ye the daughter of Zion,

Behold thy king cometh unto thee,

Meek, and riding upon an ass,

And upon a colt the foal of an ass."

John evidently understood Hebrew syntax a little better, and so he makes Jesus to ride on one ass only. (John 12: 14.)