Prophets were by no means unique to ancient Israel. Indeed, non-Israelite prophets are mentioned in the Bible itself. But the Bible provides the most extensive trove of stories about prophets available from the ancient Mediterranean world. Unlike kings and priests, whose lineage decided their status, prophets could come from within any sector of the Israelite population. Biblical prophets are not necessarily models of good behavior, but overall, they are presented as virtuous, courageous, and humble, especially in the realm of politics, and sometimes even achieved international recognition.
What Were the Roles of Prophets, Priests, and Kings?
Prophethood survived as a dynamic part of Israelite political life even after its royal and priestly counterparts came crashing to an end with the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. Prophethood, having no temple or ruling center, was a completely mobile and adaptable office, allowing it to flourish independently of physical circumstances. Because the office was so dynamic, prophets sometimes behaved as priests, and some kings were remembered as having prophetic abilities.
In most of the stories featuring prophets, however, they occupy that office alone and behave as a check on royal ambitions. While the prophets possessed gifts that would be categorized as magical today, they are most celebrated for their moral courage. They often confronted kings boldly for their greed, arrogance, or lawlessness. Those prophets who fell prey to the same vices did not necessarily lose their supernatural prophetic abilities, but they were held in low esteem nonetheless.
Prophets and the Law
The Bible today, neatly bound in a single volume, is actually a collection of diverse texts about whose origins and authorship much is unknown. The so-called “historical books” of the Hebrew Bible, Joshua–Kings, portray a nation that seems only partly aware of the traditions of the Mosaic legal corpus. In fact, Kings tells the story of an instance when a scroll of laws, possibly a part of Deuteronomy, was “discovered” in the Temple. It is a prophetess named Huldah who is consulted about its meaning and the implications of its having been lost for the nation’s future.
When, how, and in what stages the law appeared in Israelite society are questions that continue to intrigue scholars. In any case, while later Judaism came to view scripture as the locus of divine guidance, the prophets take this role in the biblical representation of that society.
Who Were the Kingmakers?
Prophets were sent by God to anoint kings. Famously, Samuel anointed a Benjamite named Saul, but later denies Saul a dynasty by anointing David, a Judahite, to succeed him. In an echo of this scenario a prophet named Ahijah anoints Jeroboam, one of Solomon’s officials, to be king of the northern tribes of Israel that would later secede from the Kingdom of Judah. In both of these cases the prophet’s action occasions—or at least correlates with—an attempt on the part of the sitting king to kill the prophesied, non-hereditary heir. Yet, the prophet’s prediction holds.
While their king-making was mostly confined to Judah and Israel, the northern prophet Elisha also anoints a court official named Hazael to be king of Aram (Syria). Such anointings of people outside royal families to kingships precede coups d’état and also assassinations. Kings, thus, not only respected but also feared prophetic pronouncements.
The King’s Conscience?
Prophets were responsible for exposing kingly abuses of power. One of the most iconic examples of this is when the prophet Nathan confronts David for his affair with Bathsheba, and his order to have her husband, one of David’s soldiers, killed in battle. While the reader is left to wonder how Nathan became aware of the scandal, his predictions are portrayed as divinely-revealed. The child David conceived with Bathsheba dies, and rampant divisions ensue in the royal family according to Nathan’s word.
There are many other examples of prophets confronting kings, but the most protracted occurs in the Elijah’s relationship with King Ahab and Queen Jezebel in the northern kingdom. The contest reaches its climax after Jezebel has an innocent farmer named Naboth executed on false premises in order to acquire his vineyard for Ahab, who has turned a blind eye. Elijah predicts Ahab and Jezebel’s bloody demise and, as the reader expects, his word holds true.
Who Were the Royal Counselors?
Prophets have a unique ability to “see” both the inevitable future and also the outcomes, one way or another, of royal decisions, and are sometimes called, simply, “seers.” This ability makes them indispensable to kings, but also a source of annoyance. How the prophets were able to “see,” however, is shrouded in the statement, “X inquired of the Lord.” The reader is left wondering how this was done. Priests had access to mysterious divining objects called the “urim and thummim,” but the mechanics even of these remains unknown today. Spontaneous avenues of revelation, such as dreams and visions, were also opened to the prophets, but of course these were not available at the prophet’s initiative.
Due in part to the hiddenness of these methods and channels, the prophetic office was ripe for imposters, and kings were often tempted to prefer prophets who predicted outcomes that favored their preferred decisions rather than those who truly possessed prophetic gifting.
Magicians and Diviners?
The prophets can appear to have magical abilities. Like the staff of Moses before him, Elijah uses his staff and cloak to perform miracles. The prophets’ bodies themselves are also presented as endowed with magic-like power. Elisha’s posthumous remains, for instance, revive a corpse when it is inadvertently thrown into a grave by grave robbers.
However, unlike a magician’s power, prophetic power in ancient Israelite understanding was subject to divine permission. For example, when a king of Moab named Balak contracts the prophet Balaam to curse Israel, God prevents Balaam’s lips from uttering anything but blessings. In a counter-example, Moses effectively uses his staff to achieve a miracle—drawing water from a rock—against divine command. Prophetic gifting can be imagined, thus, as partly up to the discretion of the prophet. In this sense, while it is more fantastical, it is not in principle different from mundane abilities possessed by other biblical characters.
Were Prophets Politicians?
In modern democracies, in which checks and balances on power valued, the biblical prophets’ relationship to royalty provides an intriguing ancient analog. Time and again, even when the monarch forces the prophet’s body into exile, hiding, or prison, aspirations to unlimited authority are invariably hobbled by the prophet’s word. That the prophets had a political role is undeniable.
Still, prophets exhibited little of what might be called political ambition today. Despite their charisma, there is no example of a prophet personally assassinating or otherwise seeking to overthrow a king’s rule in order to advance his or her own stature. When prophets anoint a person who would later overthrow a throne—as in the cases of David, Jeroboam, and Jehu—this is not the prophet’s preference, and sometimes works to their disadvantage. Successful prophets are, perhaps paradoxically, surprisingly disinterested in their own advancement. This, more than anything, is what gave them political sway.
