My beloved spiritual children in Our Risen Lord and Our Only True God and Our Only True Savior,
CHRIST IS RISEN! TRULY HE IS RISEN!

THE DEFINITION OF PROPHECY ACCORDING TO THE HOLY ORTHODOX CHRISTIAN CHURCH

On May 1st our Holy Orthodox Christian Church commemorates the Venerable Prophet Jeremiah but who are the Prophets and what is Prophecy? The Greek word προφήτης, derived from the Greek word πρόφημι (propheme), means foretell, that is, to tell beforehand. In Hebrew, the word "prophet" meant not necessarily one who foretold the future, but one commissioned by God to speak to man.

Prophet Jeremias prophesied among the captive Jews transported to Babylon, and foretold their freedom. He also prophesied against nations and cities, including Egypt, Philistia, Moab, Ammon, Edom, Damascus, Kedar, and Hazor, Elam, and Babylon.

This ever-memorable Prophet endured insults, hardships, and bore chains and imprisonment by contemporary false prophets. Almost as a solitary during this tragic period of his nation's history, he exposed immoralities, superficial reforms, and fanatical reliance in the temple. When he spoke of the coming destruction of the temple, he incurred the insults and abuse of temple priests (Jeremiah 20:2). He was even in danger of his life from his own townsmen (Jeremiah 11:21), the priests and false prophets of the temple (Jeremiah 33:8), the wayward and erratic king, and also the military (Jeremiah 45:4).

Nonetheless, he received homage from some of his people. There was also the Ethiopian slave, Abdemelech, who was stirred to help the man of God when he was cast into prison (Jeremiah 45:7). The Egyptians revered him as a Prophet while he was among them, and long after his repose.

In Orthodox Christian iconography, the Prophet is characterized as being elderly, small in bodily size, and having a beard wide at the top and narrow at the tip.

Saint Gregory the Dialogist (540-604 A.D.) distinguishes for us the various modes of prophecy used in expressing distinctions of time: "prophecy has three tenses: THE PAST, OF COURSE, THE PRESENT, AND THE FUTURE...We shall speak more truly of the three tenses of prophecy if we quote the evidence of Holy Scripture. The prophecy concerning the future: "Behold, the Virgin shall conceive in the womb, and shall bring forth a son" (Isaiah 7:14). The prophecy concerning the past: "In the beginning, God made the heaven and the earth" (Genesis 1:1). For a man speaks of a time when man was not. A prophecy about the present is when Saint Paul the holy Apostle says, "But if all keep on prophesying, and some unbeliever or one unlearned should come in, he is reproved by all, he is examined by all. And thus are the secrets of his heart become manifest; and so falling upon his face, he will make obeisance to God, reporting that God is verily among you" (1 Corinthians 14:24-25). Indeed, when it is said, "the secrets of his heart are made manifest," it is truly shown that through this mode of prophecy the Spirit does not predict what the future will be, but reveals what is. How then may it be called the spirit of prophecy which lays bare no future event but reports the present? In this case, attention must be paid to what is rightly described as prophecy, not because it predicts future events, but because it uncovers hidden truths."

Who is it that prophesies? According to Saint Basil the Great (330-379 A.D.), "the prophetic gift shines clear in souls pure and cleansed from all defilement. In a foul (dirty) mirror, you cannot see what the reflection is, neither can a soul preoccupied with cares of this life, and darkened with the passions of the lust of the flesh, receive the rays of the Holy Spirit. Every dream is not a prophecy even as it is written: "The speakers have uttered grievous things, and the diviners have seen false visions, and they have spoken false dreams" (Zachariah 10:2). Saint Anthony the Great (251-356 A.D.) maintains that in general, visions and revelations were given to the saints only in mountains and in the wilderness."

The Prophet spoke as they saw and heard, "But the prophetic ear was not the ear "of man." says Saint John Chrysostom, "for not as men did they hear, but as prophets." Thus Isaiah says, "He hath added unto me an ear to hear" (Isaiah 50:4), meaning by 'addition,' that which was from the Spirit. From whence it was plain that before hearing it had not entered into the heart of man, as it is written: "From of old we have not heard, neither have our eyes have seen" (Isaiah 64:4). For after the gift of the Spirit, the heart of the Prophets was not the heart of man, but a spiritual heart, as also Saint Paul says, "we have the mind of Christ" (1 Corinthians 2:16) as if he would say, "Before we had the blessing of the Spirit and learned the things which no man can speak, none of us nor the Prophets conceived them in his mind. How should we since not even Angels know them?" Now "prophecy is especially the work of God." Saint John Chrysostom informs us, "which devils cannot even imitate, though they strive exceedingly. For in the case of miracles there may be delusion, but exactly to foretell the future belongs to that pure Nature alone; or if devils ever have done so, it was by deceiving the simpler sort, whence their oracles are always easily detected."

The Appearance of Christ in the Old Testament

Saint Irenaeus says that "all visions of His speaking with men and being with them, such as when Jacob sees Him (Genesis 28:12-15), signify the Son of God; for it is not the Father of all, Who is not seen by the world...It is not He Who would stand circumscribed in space and speak with Abraham (cf. Genesis 18:2), but the Logos/Word of God, Who was always with mankind, and foretold what was to come to pass in the future, and, acquainted man with God."

In the Epistle (Letter) to the Hebrews, Saint Paul writes: "God, Who of old, in many parts and in many ways, spoke to the Fathers, through the Prophets, did in these last days speak to us through the Son, Whom He appointed heir of all things, by Whom also He made the ages" (Hebrews 1:1-2)." Saint John Chrysostom tells us that "this expression "in many parts and in many ways" is the same as, "And I will speak to the Prophets, and I have multiplied visions, and by the means of the Prophets I was represented" (Hosea 12:10). That it was Christ Who in the Old Testament theophanies, and not God the Father, is borne out by the Lord Himself, "The Father Who sent Me, Himself hath borne witness concerning Me. Ye have neither heard His voice at any time nor have seen His form" (John 5:37). When the holy Apostle Philip said, "Show us the Father" (John 14:8), Christ put him in the right way, persuading him to gain the knowledge of the Father through Himself. Jesus said to him, "The one who hath seen Me hath seen the Father" (John 14:9). (Source: The Lives of the Holy Prophets)

(To be continued)

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"Glory Be To GOD For All Things!" - Saint John Chrysostom

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With sincere agape in His Holy Resurrection,
The sinner and unworthy servant of God

+Father George