📙 [EN] 2. Pre-reading2: Gerhard von Rad "The Message of the Prophets"

4. In more recent study of the prophets, the question of the psychological peculiarities of the prophet's reception of revelation have markedly retreated into the background. A more pressing question is that of the particular form of the account of the vision given by the prophet and of the traditions by which he seems to have been influenced. There is good reason for this, as the account of the vision is itself part of the proclamation.

Among the receptions of visions more elaborately described in the Old Testament, those of Micaiah ben Imlah (I Kings 22.19ff.), Isaiah (Isa. 6), and Ezekiel (Ezek. 1—3) fall into the same class, for they follow what was obviously a given basic concept, that of solemn commissioning by Yahweh as he sat enthroned in the midst of his heavenly entourage. Each of the three, however, adapts the 'schema' in its own particular way. In I Kings 22.19ff. the occasion is a regular session of the assembly of the heavenly dignitaries ('one said one thing, and another said another', v. 20), until 'the spirit' comes forward and makes the proposal to delude Ahab's prophets by means of a lying spirit, to which Yahweh agrees. The spirit is then sent out forthwith. Isaiah, too, says that he saw Yahweh in the heavenly temple, seated upon his throne. The seen element, of course, plays only a small part in the narrative. When the prophet describes what he beheld, all that he mentions is the hem of the garment which reached to Yahweh's feet. Quite obviously, he had not dared to lift up his eyes. Moreover, smoke quickly clouded the scene from him. But this enhanced what he heard. He heard the seraphim's Trisagion, the thunder of which made the palace shake. At this direct encounter with supreme holiness and in this atmosphere of sheer adoration, Isaiah became conscious of his own sinfulness and was appalled — indeed, the sin of his whole nation seemed to be made manifest in his own person. At his confession of sin Yahweh made a sign — Isaiah did not, of course, see this — and a rite of atonement, which now made it possible for him to raise his voice in this holy place, was performed upon his lips. On hearing Yahweh ask whom he could send (the term 'send' is used quite absolutely), Isaiah with a minimum of words and without more ado put himself at his Lord's disposal, and was forthwith given his commission, which was to make his nation stubborn and harden their hearts by the very message he was to proclaim, 'until cities are laid waste and the fields in the open country are like waste land'; a holy seed was, however, to remain. Even in the prophetic literature, where the extraordinary is not the exception but the rule, there is very, very little to compare with the grandeur of the verses in which Isaiah describes his call. Does this lie in the overwhelming splendour of its outward accompaniments, or in the mighty power of the spiritual experience? Yet even to put such a question is to tear apart the classic balance between external and internal. The description of the external embraces all the inward experience, and vice versa.

Ezekiel, too, sees Yahweh sitting on his throne. With him, however, the description of the vision is much more involved, since in his case the throne vision is united with what was originally an entirely different and independent idea, that of the descent of the 'glory of God', to form a single complex unit. Here, therefore, the heavens open, and Yahweh's throne, borne by four heavenly beings, comes down to earth on storm-clouds. The manner of the prophet's call to office is similar to that of Isaiah except that in this case there is a still stronger impression that he received his commission in the form of what could almost be called a state-paper. For the king on the throne hands the waiting ambassador a scroll containing his instructions. There is also another similarity between the calls of Ezekiel and Isaiah. The prophet is repeatedly reminded of the difficulty and even hopelessness of his position by the words with which Yahweh accompanies the delivery of the note: the people to whom he is sent are of a hard forehead and a stubborn heart. This whole commissioning is hedged about with words which prepare Ezekiel for the failure of what he undertakes, though the latter lays much greater stress than does Isaiah on his hearers' freedom to refuse to listen to him (Ezek. 3.7, 11).

The three visions just considered thus end by indicating a completely negative result — in no sense will the prophet's work lead to deliverance; it will only hasten on the inevitable disaster. The ideas which the three men each held about the nature of their calling must have been very much alike: there must have been some kind of common call-experience which put a stamp upon their work from the very outset. Their devastatingly negative outlook on the future of their work, and the way in which, without any illusions, they faced up to its complete failure, are again a factor which compels us to look for these prophets outside the cult. For cult always implies at least a minimum of effect; it is action which  has beneficial results in one way or another.

The call of Jeremiah begins with a dialogue in which Yahweh gently but firmly breaks down the other's shrinking resistance to his commission. Then follow the two visions of the rod of almond and the seething cauldron, which indeed fall very short of the forcefulness of the other three which have just been discussed. In other respects Jeremiah was a master of expression. Here, however, his creative power is clearly less than usual. Even in the dialogue which precedes the visions Jeremiah surprises us. He says that Yahweh touched his mouth. There is no indication, however, that he saw Yahweh as well as heard him. It was not in Jeremiah's power to give a visual picture of the presence of Yahweh.

In the visions themselves he beheld two static objects — there is no motion — which in themselves are quite unremarkable. Only the words of Yahweh which follow the visions and interpret them indicate the objects' symbolic character — Yahweh is watching over his word, it is never out of his sight: and evil is to break upon Jerusalem and Judah from the north. Here, too, something of the magnificent realism which elsewhere characterizes the descriptions of the dealings between Yahweh and Jeremiah is missing. In Jeremiah's visions nothing at all is done. The rod of almond and the seething cauldron are both simply things: what the prophet sees is little more than an illustrative and symbolic picture which serves to corroborate the message given to him. The substance of Jeremiah's visions is no longer some irrevocable act which Yahweh is about to do. Compared with the visions in 1 Kings 22, Isa. 6, and Ezek. 1—3, those of Jeremiah display a distinct lack of action. Their content is rather the symbolic illustration of more general insights which are to dominate his preaching from now on. On the other hand, even in the account of Jeremiah's call there is still the framework of an official commissioning, an appointment to a particular service made by a superior ('I have appointed you to…'; 'I have set you this day over…'). Perhaps the outline of the external event is so markedly incomplete because the reader would himself supply what was missing? ^[1]

Deutero-lsaiah received his call by means of two auditions. He had no vision, nor was he directly called by Yahweh. Instead, his ear caught something of the movement that had made itself felt in the heavenly places. He heard the summons given to the angelic beings to build the wondrous way over valley and mountain to prepare for that coming of Yahweh in which he would manifest himself to the world (Isa. 40.3-5). The first audition, therefore, only allowed the prophet to learn something of the preparations which were already being made in heaven for Yahweh's imminent advent — and this before there was even the slightest indication of it upon earth. In the second, however, he was directly addressed evidently by an angel — and given the theme of his preaching: amid the transience of 'all flesh', a transience which was caused by Yahweh's own fiery breath, Yahweh's word alone is permanent, and is the guarantee of permanency (Isa. 40.6-8).

Little can be said about the frequency with which the various prophets received such extraordinary revelations. The number of visions and auditions reported in grand literary style is certainly nothing to go on. As we saw, such subsequent elaborations had a definite purpose to serve with visions received at a call. In other cases there was no interest in giving an express and studied description of what the prophet had seen; then he simply confined himself to communicating its contents. There are plenty of oracles of this kind which quite clearly derive from genuine visionary or auditory experiences. This can certainly be presumed in the case of the description of the onslaught of the nations against Zion and their miraculous repulse in Isa. 17.12ff. The same is true of the theophany in Isa. 30.27f. or in Isa. 63.1ff., as it is also of descriptions of anguish such as Nah. 2.2ff. [1ff.], where the visual element is particularly conspicuous. It also holds good of Jeremiah's anticipations of the wars to come (Jer. 4—6): they are so shot through with the prophet's sensory perceptions as to leave no doubt of their visionary and auditory character. ^[2]

It is impossible exactly to separate out visionary experiences which were genuinely ecstatic from other forms of the reception of revelation. Yahweh had assuredly more ways than one of communicating with the prophets, but it is hopeless to try to gain clear ideas about the psychical side of the processes. Isaiah says that Yahweh revealed himself 'in his ears' (Isa. 5.9, 22.14); so, too, Ezekiel (Ezek. 9.1, 5), and elsewhere.^[3]  Thus, there were also revelations which took the form of an auditory experience and nothing more. Jeremiah makes a clear distinction between oral revelation and revelation by means of a dream, and sets little store by the latter (Jer. 23.28). The experience of receiving a word also occasionally attained a high degree of excitation; otherwise, how could Ezekiel have likened the sound of the wings of the cherubim which could be heard from afar to the resounding of the voice of Yahweh, 'when he speaks' (Ezek. 10.5)? On the other hand, we have good reason to believe that the prophets were also given inspiration in which no kind of change came over their ordinary consciousness, that is to say, in which the revelation was a mental process. This is probably so in the great majority of those cases in which the prophet speaks only of the word of Yahweh which had come to him. Nevertheless, even here the element of 'event' which the revelation had for the prophet ought not to be overlooked. It is not simply a matter of mental perception, but of the 'coming' of the word of Yahweh, and, consequently, even with this quite unsensational form of revelation the prophets never lost the feeling that there was something strange in the experience.

Oddly enough, Job's friend Eliphaz also gives an account of an experience in which he received a revelation similar to that of the prophets.

A word stole to me, my ear perceived a whisper of it, in disquieting thoughts, amid visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on men.

Dread seized me and trembling, it made all my limbs shake; a spirit glided over my face, the hair of my flesh stood up.

It stood still —; but I could not discern its appearance; a form was before me, I heard a still low voice:

'Can a mortal man be in the right before God, or a man be pure before his Maker?'

(Job 4.12-17)

This is easily our most comprehensive and detailed description of the outward circumstances which accompanied a revelation. It certainly cannot be dismissed by saying that Eliphaz was not of course a prophet. The clearest proof of how little a prophet he was is the 'oracle' in v.17, which is in fact not an oracle at all, but runs counter to the whole prophetic tradition and takes the form of a rhetorical question; this means that it is a saying of the kind found in the wisdom literature. None the less, it may be assumed that when Eliphaz describes the psychical accompaniments of a revelation, he takes as his basis genuine prophetic tradition.

The time for receiving a revelation of the kind is the night. It is heralded by disquiet and feelings of fear. Then little by little the sensory organs are stimulated, first touch, then sight, and finally hearing.

The frequency with which such revelations were received is a question about which little can be said so far as each individual case is concerned, but a general survey of prophecy from the eighth to the sixth century does lead to one important result. Basically Amos had one task and one alone to do: 'Go and prophesy against my people Israel' (Amos 7.15). No doubt this embraced a considerable number of word-revelations which may have come hard on each other's heels during the time in which he was active. Yet his activity may well have been limited in duration: it was conceivably only a matter of months; then — perhaps because he was expelled by Amaziah — he went back home and his charisma thereafter ceased. With Isaiah it was different. His prophecy surges up in a number of separate waves, which were in each case determined by specific political situations. Yet, what we know of his activity makes perfectly clear that even he regarded the various occasions on which he came forward as of limited duration, and that, as each ended, he could consider himself released from office. With Jeremiah, however, the calling meant a lifelong office. Later on we shall have to consider in more detail the great change which came over the whole idea of the nature of prophetic service at this point — how the prophet's whole life became bound up with Yahweh's dealings with his people, and how this exhausted him. Here — at least in principle — there were no distinct phases in the exercise of his office, no several stages ending when a specified task had been duly performed. Jeremiah was a prophet because Yahweh had conscripted his whole life. ¹⁰

As far as the reception of revelation is concerned, Jeremiah makes it clear that he sometimes had to wait a considerable time for an answer (Jer. 28.12; 42.7). When in contrast with this the Servant in Deutero-lsaiah — and his office was above all else a prophetic one — says that Yahweh 'morning by morning awakens his ear' (Isa. 50.4), this undoubtedly marks a decisive advance upon what Jeremiah could say about himself. Indeed, it signifies the climax of prophecy in the Old Testament. For what the Servant is trying to say is that his reception of revelation was continuous, and his converse with Yahweh unbroken.