Commentaria in Scripturam Sacram, Vol. 11: Prolegomena (prefaces and canons)
That Isaias is the lion is plain from his chap. xxi, ver. 6, where he hears from the Lord: “Thus,” he says, “said the Lord to me: Go, and set a watchman: and let him tell whatsoever he shall see.” And presently ver. 8: “And the lion cried out: I am upon the watch-tower of the Lord, standing continually by day: and I am upon my ward, standing whole nights.” For the lion, being watchful, is the symbol of the watcher and sentinel. For this reason Isaias roars, thunders and lightens like a lion. “Hear, O ye heavens,” he says, chap. i, ver. 2, “and give ear, O earth. Woe to the sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungodly children: they have forsaken the Lord, they have blasphemed the Holy One of Israel, they are gone away backward.” And ver. 10: “Hear the word of the Lord, ye princes of Sodom, give ear to the law of our God… How is the faithful city, that was full of judgment, become a harlot? Justice dwelt in it, but now murderers. Thy princes are faithless, companions of thieves: they all love bribes, they run after rewards.”
That Jeremias is the ox is clear from his unceasing labors, by which he tilled the field of the Lord, and from his continual afflictions, with which the Jews harassed him, and at last sacrificed him like a victim to God, and by stoning crowned him a Martyr. Hear him chap. xi, ver. 19: “And I was as a meek lamb (in Hebrew alluph, that is, an ox, as Vatablus, Pagninus and others translate, as if to say: I was as a lamb, and as an ox) that is carried to be a victim: and I knew not that they had devised counsels against me, saying: Let us put wood on his bread, and cut him off from the land of the living.”
That Ezechiel is denoted by the man, God himself teaches, who, revealing to him the oracles, continually calls him son of man. So chap. ii, ver. 1: “And he said to me: Son of man, stand upon thy feet, and I will speak to thee.” And ver. 3: “Son of man, I send thee to the children of Israel, to apostate nations.” And chap. iii, ver. 1: “Son of man, eat whatsoever thou shalt find.” And chap. iv, ver. 1: “Son of man, take thee a tile.”
That Daniel is represented by the eagle is plain from this, that Daniel was the wisest of all mortals in that age: wherefore God, mocking ironically the king of Tyre, who seemed to himself the wisest: “Behold,” he says, “thou art wiser than Daniel: no secret is hidden from thee,” Ezech. xxviii, 3. For Daniel, a man abstemious and a man of desires, poising himself in heaven like an eagle, and continually conversing with God, from that lofty watch-tower of eternity, with eagle eyes clearly beheld the whole series of all the ages, and penetrated the very last things of the world: he alone, indeed, depicts to the life the course, revolution and succession of the four monarchies; the deeds of Darius and Alexander; the wars of Antiochus with Scipio and the Romans; the battles between the Seleucidae and Ptolemies, between the Antiochi and the Jews; the birth and death of Christ at the end of the seventy weeks; the life, character, persecution and destruction of Antichrist; the resurrection, the glory of the Blessed, and the happy and eternal kingdom of Christ, so that he seems to behold it near and to show it to others to behold. And at last he concludes with this golden sentence: “But they that are learned shall shine as the brightness of the firmament: and they that instruct many to justice, as stars for all eternity.”
Moreover what Ezechiel says of these living creatures, that they were full of eyes, fits the Prophets best. For the Prophets were the eyes of the Synagogue, and likewise of the Church. And that: “Whithersoever the impulse of the spirit was to go, thither they went;” and: “The living creatures ran and returned like flashes of lightning.”
But lest I run on too long, I come to the matter proposed, namely, to prophecy and the Prophets: but before we hear them speaking and reasoning, five questions concerning them must be premised. First, what prophecy is. Second, how many kinds. Third, the cause of the Prophets, their matter, manner of speaking, argument, their functions and offices. Fourth, when, in what order, and on what subject each of the Prophets prophesied. Fifth, concerning their obscurity and difficulty, and in what way and manner it is to be overcome.
I. THE FIRST QUESTION. It is asked therefore first: What is prophecy? What is its nature and essence? St. Chrysostom teaches, in the proem to the Psalms, vol. i: “The whole kind of prophecy,” he says, “is divided threefold, into future, present and past. For prophecy is the discovery of what is hidden: as was done by Peter, who detected the theft of Ananias and Sapphira,” Acts v. Cassiodorus, preface to the Psalms: “Prophecy,” he says, “is a divine inspiration, foreknowing and foretelling with immovable truth and the greatest certainty the events of things far distant from us.” From this definition St. Gregory teaches, hom. 4 on Ezech., that the Prophet embraces threefold and all time, namely past, present and future: for the events of all these can be far distant; and therefore prophecy is threefold. “Prophecy,” he says, “is of the future: Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son. Prophecy of the past: In the beginning God created heaven and earth; for of that time man spoke, when man was not.” So also Daniel, by the spirit of prophecy, narrated to the king the dream which he had forgotten, and afterwards interpreted it, Daniel chap. ii. “Prophecy of the present is when the Apostle Paul says, 1 Cor. xiv: But if all prophesy, and there come in one that believeth not, or an unlearned person, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all: and the secrets of his heart are made manifest. It is rightly therefore called prophecy, not because it foretells the future, but because it discloses what is hidden. Thus Giezi had departed far from the Prophet when he received the gifts of Naaman the Syrian; to whom nevertheless the Prophet says: Was not my heart present, when the man turned back from his chariot to meet thee?” 4 Kings v. Thus John the Baptist was a Prophet, because he showed Christ, unknown to the world, saying: “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who taketh away the sin of the world,” John i. Thus Ahias, blind, prophesied, when by God’s inspiration he recognized the wife of Jeroboam pretending to be another, and said: “Come in, thou wife of Jeroboam: why feignest thou thyself to be another? but I am sent to thee a hard messenger,” 3 Kings xiv, 6. Thus Elizabeth by the spirit of prophecy recognized the Word incarnate in the womb of the Blessed Mary, when she said to her: “Whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” Luke i. For it is of equal difficulty and power and wisdom to reveal hidden things, for example the secret thoughts of men, as to foretell future things: for both require a supernatural and divine light, namely the revelation of God, as St. Thomas teaches, II-II, Question clxxi, art. 3. The same teaches … I say “hidden,” that is, as hidden: for it can happen that what is open, seen or known to one is hidden to another: then those things can be prophetically revealed to this one which others know by sense or demonstration; as others knew the wife of Jeroboam by her form; but Ahias, blind, knew her only by prophecy. So St. Thomas. But St. Gregory rightly warns in the same place, saying: “In two times prophecy loses its etymology; because since it is called prophecy because it foretells the future, when it speaks of the past or present it loses the reason of its name.” And Tertullian, Apology xvii: “Prophecy,” he says, “is so called from the office of foretelling.” Prophecy therefore, properly, is only of future things: “Every prophecy is an image of the future. The future house of God was foretold to the prophets in an image,” says St. Augustine on Psalm cxxxi. Wherefore with St. Thomas and the Scholastics, II-II, Question clxxi, art. 3, we shall define prophecy properly thus: “Prophecy is a divine inspiration or revelation, foreseeing and foretelling with certain and immovable truth the events of future contingent things.” Hence prophecy in Hebrew is sometimes called chazon, that is, vision; the prophets, previsores, foreseers. For they were as the mouth of the Lord and the eyes of the Church: because they saw the visions shown them by God, to be communicated to the whole Church. Hence St. Basil, preface to Isaias: “The Prophets,” he says, “are called Seers, because they behold things to come as present.”
I say in the definition “divine:” because God alone can foreknow and foretell with certainty future contingent things. For to God alone, because he is eternal, omniscient and of immense power, all things, future as well as past and present, are continually presented, and are objectively before his eyes, even when they do not exist in nature. For the infinite keenness of his mind, and power of knowing, surpasses the existence of things, and pervades and penetrates all times, as well as places, and equals, nay transcends, every truth. For every truth, whether existing or not existing; whether present, past, or future; whether absolute, conditional, or possible, is reached and seen through by that infinite mind, and the eye of God. Wherefore some have rightly said: “The Prophets are made partakers of eternity by God.” Prophecy therefore is nothing else than the divine revelation and speaking, presented and infused by God into the mind of the Prophet, in such a manner and with such light that he knew with certainty that it was infused into him from God and from no other. For God, whether he speak by himself or by Angels, can give the mind most certain signs of himself, though they be unknown to the inexperienced, so that it may know for certain that God is speaking within it, not the demon, not nature.